Silk Road forums
Discussion => Philosophy, Economics and Justice => Topic started by: Reason on 24 August 2013, 14:57:27
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Hello All,
I'd be very interested to see if some of my fellow
and esteemed SR friends could convince me to take back up the banner of
Libertarianism again.
As my subject suggests, I used to
be a Libertarian. However, I slowly came to the conclusion that it
just won't work. I've now concluded that Libertariansim is a lot
like Communism, they both look pretty good on paper, but neither
adequately incorporates certain realities of human nature. In
fact, they both have the same basic failing, they assume too much
uniformity in the human condition, and are too optimistic about that
condition.
In Communism, the problem is that it assumes no one
really has a desire to have "more" than someone else. It assumes
that the most capable will be happy to get the same share as the least
capable. Share and share alike. Ridiculous. Brain
surgeons want Bentleys, not Yugos.
Libertarianism assumes
everyone is ready and willing to compete and work hard, and that
everyone has something special to bring to market, if only given the
chance. Ridiculous as well. Here's why.
The world is filled with four kind of people in my estimation:
1) Those whom cannot "do"
2) Those whom can "do" a little but are not very motivated to do so.
3) Those whom can "do" a little and are motivated to do so.
4) Those whom can "do" a lot, and are super motivated.
In
the perfect Libertarian society, those whom inhabit type 3 & 4
would represent a middle and upper class (modestly well off, and rich
respectively). The 1s and 2s would all be poor, and with no
governemnt hand-outs would live in squalor unless the 3s & 4s, out
of the kindness of their hearts supported them (which is not going to
happen, lets face it...we pity the poor...we don't actually like them).
The
problem here is that the 1s & 2s...outnumber the 3s and 4s..by
quite a large margin in my estimation. Incapable and unmotivated
though they may be...they all want to live and feel dignified...and they
can all fire a gun.
In the long term, this would lead to violence, and a displacement of the Libertarian system.
Thus
I've concluded that the best system is pretty much like the one we have
here in the US (and in many other Western contries). There is a
safety net, designed to keep the 1s & 2s safe from falling too far
into poverty...and keeping the 3s and 4s safe from angry and violent
mobs. It's more like a firewall than a safety net.
The
only question is...at what level the safety net must be placed...and
this will constantly need to be adjusted (based on the economic and
social conditions), which our republic is at least dimly able to
do over time. It also allows the 3s and 4s to accumulate some
wealth, and out of necessity forcibly extracts some of it from them for
the safety net (taxes).
It is of course, not an optimal system,
but the problem is...that people are not perfect...and thus our system
must reflect this reality.
If you think differntly, then please share where has my reasoning failed me? :-)
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My 2 cents on why Libertarianism & Anarchism can't work is that
both of these theories assume all people are responsible and mature
persons. But if you have any experience in dealing with people, you
cannot possibly come to that conclusion. Some people just need parents
to make sure they won't do anything stupid. That's why we unfortunately
need a government. I'd love Libertarianism if everyone acted like a
responsible person.
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I agree Chil, it's an unfortunate truth that many people just don't have it goin' on.
I
worked the polls for the Libertarian party one year, and this was the
beginning of the end for me. I was absolutely blown away by the
ignorance (willfull, or not) of the vast majority of the voters. I
desperately tried to engage people in thoughtful discussion, but was
dismayed that most people didn't know what the Bill of Rights was, nor
how many branches of government we have, nor even how many states there
were.
They didn't even really know why they were voting
the way they did...most just came for the free donuts. They all
however voted that day.
It was quite enlightening. It gave me a new appreciation of our system (flawed though it is).
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Hey Reason, what are your thoughts on a stateless society? Any speculation on why it may or may not work?
The
problem I see with the current social model is that it uses aggression
to achieve results, i.e. taxation, throwing people in jail for having
vegetation on their person. What don't have to be perfect to realize
that's just plain BS. I don't think that we solve the problem of
injustice and an imbalance of merely economic power by creating a
monolithic leviathan state with the ability to start up its own laws,
initiate force at will, print up its own money and to imprison at a
whim.
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I agree Chil, it's an unfortunate truth that many people just don't have it goin' on.
I
worked the polls for the Libertarian party one year, and this was the
beginning of the end for me. I was absolutely blown away by the
ignorance (willfull, or not) of the vast majority of the voters. I
desperately tried to engage people in thoughtful discussion, but was
dismayed that most people didn't know what the Bill of Rights was, nor
how many branches of government we have, nor even how many states there
were.
They didn't even really know why they were voting
the way they did...most just came for the free donuts. They all
however voted that day.
It was quite enlightening. It gave me a new appreciation of our system (flawed though it is).
Hope
this wasn't for the presidential race..... If you dedicate time to that
endeavor then you are an idiot. Americans voting in the general
presidential election are wasting there energy as those votes
don't even really count. Presidential elections are nothing more than a
boat and pony show to keep us quiet. Americans don't choose the
President, the fucking electoral college does. And the good people of
Washington DC get to pay taxes and don't get a presidential vote so
anyone paying taxes in DC is fucking stupid too. You are taxed without
ANY representation AT ALL and don't even get to participate in the FAKE
ELECTIONS held every 4 years. Wake up people..... Voting for the
president is like picking out a new pope. You have nothing to do with it
and it is nothing more than a show for the people.
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What about Ayn Rand's vision of a capitalist society? It is almost
libertarian but I feel it addresses the shortcomings of
base-libertarianism.
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What exactly are the 3's and 4's doing for society that makes them
super motivated? Seems like A LOT(by no means all, the advances our
species has made are astounding) of them are stealing money, and not
actually making many contributions. They're motivated by "more"
with no real goal in mind. I suppose that you're right about some people
just not ever being able to be with it. Although a lot of those greedy
fucks are miserable. I'd rather be a poor farmer that is able to be
happy his whole life then a miserable rich banker that has 45 houses.
(the farmer may not be remembered but the banker will be remembered as
greedy) Far enough down the timeline they'll both be forgotten.
I
don't exactly think exploitation of our own species is the way forward,
it's like we(some) think we're invincible and the earth is an endless
mine to make profit off of. Our stupidity could easily be the end of us.
Sometimes we mistake stupidity for intelligence...
Although just
looking at the education system in America should tell you a lot. I'm
not sure about other countries but i'm sure they aren't much better off.
You can graduate high school without taking Algebra in some places...
Look at the history that is taught, it's all watered down and then spoon
fed.( of course His-story, will never be 100% but i mean really?)
To do any actual learning you need to do it yourself. Most of the
teachers are as boring and unethusiastic as the rest of the people. If
you aren't already knowledgeable why the fuck would you be motivated to
try and become more intelligent? Society classifies you from the
beginning and makes you feel like shit if you aren't smart enough.
Things like art and music aren't taken seriously. The world is this dark
terrible place that you need to find your place in, and make a living
the way the 3's and 4's say is ok. That's my opinion anyway.
Call
me crazy but i have hope for the future, maybe it's too many drugs who
the fuck knows. But seriously why the fuck aren't we in space?
Nasa really only gets half a penny from our tax dollars? (might be a
penny, ask my nigga neal) How much does the drug war get? I don't know
how you can say this is the best system we have without laughing.
I
don't think you need to classify your belief system, just believe what
you think or feel is right. Why limit yourself to others view points? As
far as people not being perfect you're right, so why would a system we
created over a century ago be the best thing for us today? I think the
most important changes need to be in education first, sure i'd love an
irrational utopian society as much as the next guy, but i don't think
humans will be capable of that for a long time. One mans utopia is
another mans dystopia. That doesn't mean we can't create a system that
is pretty fucking good though, and a hell of a lot better than the
current one in place.
Why is buying fresh organic food harder
than buying GMO's and other processed foods? And why are there so many
government laws that go against small farmers? We really can't grow our
own godamn food now?Since when do these psychos think they own the
earth? It's almost laughable, then you realize it's the real situation.
Fuck this society, it's collapse is inevitable.
I know there's a
bunch of grammatical errors and non linear thoughts there, but it's
certainly some stuff to think about i guess.
Some more food for
thought, the majority of scientists think liberally minded. One of the
most respected scientists, carl sagan thought this way. Just read
cosmos. :) And listen to neal degrass tyson, very smart man.
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Hello All,
I'd
be very interested to see if some of my fellow and esteemed SR friends
could convince me to take back up the banner of Libertarianism
again.
As my subject suggests, I used to be a
Libertarian. However, I slowly came to the conclusion that it just
won't work. I've now concluded that Libertariansim is a lot like
Communism, they both look pretty good on paper, but neither adequately
incorporates certain realities of human nature. In fact, they both
have the same basic failing, they assume too much uniformity in the
human condition, and are too optimistic about that condition.
In
Communism, the problem is that it assumes no one really has a desire to
have "more" than someone else. It assumes that the most capable
will be happy to get the same share as the least capable. Share
and share alike. Ridiculous. Brain surgeons want Bentleys,
not Yugos.
Libertarianism assumes everyone is ready and
willing to compete and work hard, and that everyone has something
special to bring to market, if only given the chance. Ridiculous
as well. Here's why.
The world is filled with four kind of people in my estimation:
1) Those whom cannot "do"
2) Those whom can "do" a little but are not very motivated to do so.
3) Those whom can "do" a little and are motivated to do so.
4) Those whom can "do" a lot, and are super motivated.
In
the perfect Libertarian society, those whom inhabit type 3 & 4
would represent a middle and upper class (modestly well off, and rich
respectively). The 1s and 2s would all be poor, and with no
governemnt hand-outs would live in squalor unless the 3s & 4s, out
of the kindness of their hearts supported them (which is not going to
happen, lets face it...we pity the poor...we don't actually like them).
The
problem here is that the 1s & 2s...outnumber the 3s and 4s..by
quite a large margin in my estimation. Incapable and unmotivated
though they may be...they all want to live and feel dignified...and they
can all fire a gun.
In the long term, this would lead to violence, and a displacement of the Libertarian system.
Thus
I've concluded that the best system is pretty much like the one we have
here in the US (and in many other Western contries). There is a
safety net, designed to keep the 1s & 2s safe from falling too far
into poverty...and keeping the 3s and 4s safe from angry and violent
mobs. It's more like a firewall than a safety net.
The
only question is...at what level the safety net must be placed...and
this will constantly need to be adjusted (based on the economic and
social conditions), which our republic is at least dimly able to
do over time. It also allows the 3s and 4s to accumulate some
wealth, and out of necessity forcibly extracts some of it from them for
the safety net (taxes).
It is of course, not an optimal system,
but the problem is...that people are not perfect...and thus our system
must reflect this reality.
If you think differntly, then please share where has my reasoning failed me? :-)
1) If people aren't ready to compete or work hard, then why would you give them shit for free?
2)
disabled people or people whom can't work, there are not a ton of those
people, if you have proper definitions of what is considered disabled
(not being able to dial a phone number is enough to get a disabled
sticker on your car) then you cut the number of disabled down A LOT. So
those people can be taken care of via other means.
3) People
wouldn't need a safety-net, because you wouldn't be reliant on
businesses to hire you. You could sell drugs, you could start up a
service (be it car repair or whatever you want) If you are working for
someone else and you get downsized or w/e you take what you learned from
that business and start a competing business or a start up. If people
aren't willing to do that, then they have to deal with that choice, why
is my responsibility to make people happy or not poor?
I don't
have all the answers or a solution for every problem, but I know
hundreds, if not thousands of people whom have really good ideas, but
can't do it because it takes so much money to even start a business. Get
rid of the regulatory system and you will see business boom and
unemployment drop to nearly zero. Will there be tragedy of the commons
issues? absolutely, but just like anything else, people have a way to
fix those issues. The market will find the bad businesses and destroy
them then good business will thrive! There would be no LLC, no CORP
protection. no government to protect big business interest, lobbying
would die and businesses would thrive.
I'd rather go through growing pangs in a free market than the system we have now.
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Sorry, but aside from the illegality of selling drugs, what exactly
are these 'huge barriers to entry' for starting a new business that you
believe aren't currently possible under the current western system?
(+1 for you, Reason. A nicely reasoned, non-dogmatic dialogue starter!)
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Sorry,
but aside from the illegality of selling drugs, what exactly are these
'huge barriers to entry' for starting a new business that you believe
aren't currently possible under the current western system?
(+1 for you, Reason. A nicely reasoned, non-dogmatic dialogue starter!)
If
you operate a Bitcoin exchange you need to know my customers. Running a
digital currency exchange in the USA is begging to go to prison even if
you try to follow the law. You need to figure out how much tax you owe,
etc. If you make a new drug it needs to be approved by the FDA. There
are regulations and laws galore, you are naive as hell if you think
drugs being illegal to sell is the only way that the government
strangles businesses.
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The real issue is to deal with people who fall into #2, which would
leave 3/4ths of the society that you've modeled in tact and
functional--assuming #1 is no greater than ~1-8% of the population.
People
of #2 are the reason why the rest suffer. In any economy that you
structure, those people would be the ones you'd have to work around the
most.
Also, you make one err: assuming that "hard work"
equals more money. This has shown not the be the case, albeit somewhat
indirectly.
1) Assume we live in an industrial nation (we do)
2) Assume said industrialization has moved labor from being physically-oriented to mental (it has)
3) Assume there are stratifications of "hard work," each coinciding by the level of difficulty of the mental task.
4) Thus the more challenging jobs are the ones that require the highest amount of thought.
There
are Engineers making the next product, who will be outearned by a CEO
who studied buisness and had a few connects. Clearly hard work does not
always equate.
Honestly, although I enjoyed your post, it's very
black/white, which is inherently the problem with non-dynamic government
systems.
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Sorry,
but aside from the illegality of selling drugs, what exactly are these
'huge barriers to entry' for starting a new business that you believe
aren't currently possible under the current western system?
(+1 for you, Reason. A nicely reasoned, non-dogmatic dialogue starter!)
If
you operate a Bitcoin exchange you need to know my customers. Running a
digital currency exchange in the USA is begging to go to prison even if
you try to follow the law. You need to figure out how much tax you owe,
etc. If you make a new drug it needs to be approved by the FDA. There
are regulations and laws galore, you are naive as hell if you think
drugs being illegal to sell is the only way that the government
strangles businesses.
So
Alternative B being you just release a new untested drug on the
unsuspecting populous and then hide behind libertarianism when they
start dying?
I know, I know....the response you just started
typing runs along the lines of "Well, they're stupid and deserved to die
because nobody forced them to take the drugs blah blah blah".
Again,
this is the problem I have with especially US-style
libertarianism. It's just so sanctimonious, non-empathetic AND is
in complete denial when it comes to human psychology. Complete
freedom is a myth. Heck, even Krauss doesn't believe in free will,
and he's a popular science writer!
And why is it, that every
time I meet or talk to a libertarian, they're always white, middle
class, disaffected 'engineer-type' personalities? They don't
understand or 'like' people, so they chew their xanax like lollies and
grumble about how stupid people are and how the government is out to get
them and how mum doesn't like their pot use.
Libertarians never
work in the social sciences, they're never at the soup kitchens, helping
the homeless, donating to NGO's, doing volunteer work....they're always
snivelling white guys in black jeans complaining about things but never
actually doing anything except pushing their own barrow. It's all
about me, me, and people who think like me, look like me, could
possibly help me out when things turn to shit because I'm not half as
smart as I think I am type guys.
And there's always a 50:1
male/female ratio at libertarian meetups, to boot. That tells ya
something. And that 1 female has some major daddy issues.
:)
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So many thoughtful and interesting comments and questions! Many thanks to you all for engaging in this fun exercise.
Hey Reason, what are your thoughts on a stateless society? Any speculation on why it may or may not work?
I'm
uncertain that this would work. My primary concern is that
government (good government) provides a great deal of structure within
which humans can conduct themselves safely, in other words rule of
law. Without rule of law, we bascially have mob justice, and might
makes right, and this would not allow non-violent people to be able to
excel. This may seem odd coming from a SR user, however, I
honestly believe that a large part of my willingness to participate is
an act of civil disobedience. I don't agree with the law in this
case and actively try to change it and defy it. I do however
respect the concept of rule of law.
Complete freedom has no rules on behavior at all, and would descend into a lord of the flies world. Not attractive IMO.
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I agree Chil, it's an unfortunate truth that many people just don't have it goin' on.
I
worked the polls for the Libertarian party one year, and this was the
beginning of the end for me. I was absolutely blown away by the
ignorance (willfull, or not) of the vast majority of the voters.
Hope
this wasn't for the presidential race..... If you dedicate time to that
endeavor then you are an idiot. ...Americans don't choose the
President, the fucking electoral college does. ... Wake up people.....
Voting for the president is like picking out a new pope. You have
nothing to do with it and it is nothing more than a show for the people.
I'm
afraid that it was. However, I don't necessarily agree with your
characterization of the electoral college. Granted, in most states
the outcome is a foregone conclusion, however, there are many so called
"battle ground" states in which the outcome is not only up in the air,
but has a decisive effect on the outcome. Certainly this is why
campaigns are so damned expensive. I can't imagine they'd drop
that kind of cash for a simply show.
However, given the state of
the electorate, these contests are not nearly as much intellectual
debates of merit of the various platforms, but more akin to beauty
contests. Participating as I did was not idiotic, but in
retrospect it was rather ill informed.
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What
about Ayn Rand's vision of a capitalist society? It is almost
libertarian but I feel it addresses the shortcomings of
base-libertarianism.
While
deeply involved in the ideas of Libertarianism I tried to read Atlas
Shrugged. Ugh...it was awful and couldn't get through it. So
I'm afriad I'm unfamiliar with her concepts. Can you share some
of the core tenets?
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What
exactly are the 3's and 4's doing for society that makes them super
motivated? Seems like A LOT(by no means all, the advances our species
has made are astounding) of them are stealing money, and not actually
making many contributions. They're motivated by "more" with no
real goal in mind. I suppose that you're right about some people just
not ever being able to be with it. Although a lot of those greedy fucks
are miserable. I'd rather be a poor farmer that is able to be happy his
whole life then a miserable rich banker that has 45 houses. (the farmer
may not be remembered but the banker will be remembered as greedy) Far
enough down the timeline they'll both be forgotten.
I don't
exactly think exploitation of our own species is the way forward, it's
like we(some) think we're invincible and the earth is an endless mine to
make profit off of. Our stupidity could easily be the end of us.
Sometimes we mistake stupidity for intelligence...
Although just
looking at the education system in America should tell you a lot. I'm
not sure about other countries but i'm sure they aren't much better off.
You can graduate high school without taking Algebra in some places...
Look at the history that is taught, it's all watered down and then spoon
fed.( of course His-story, will never be 100% but i mean really?)
To do any actual learning you need to do it yourself. Most of the
teachers are as boring and unethusiastic as the rest of the people. If
you aren't already knowledgeable why the fuck would you be motivated to
try and become more intelligent? Society classifies you from the
beginning and makes you feel like shit if you aren't smart enough.
Things like art and music aren't taken seriously. The world is this dark
terrible place that you need to find your place in, and make a living
the way the 3's and 4's say is ok. That's my opinion anyway.
Call
me crazy but i have hope for the future, maybe it's too many drugs who
the fuck knows. But seriously why the fuck aren't we in space?
Nasa really only gets half a penny from our tax dollars? (might be a
penny, ask my nigga neal) How much does the drug war get? I don't know
how you can say this is the best system we have without laughing.
I
don't think you need to classify your belief system, just believe what
you think or feel is right. Why limit yourself to others view points? As
far as people not being perfect you're right, so why would a system we
created over a century ago be the best thing for us today? I think the
most important changes need to be in education first, sure i'd love an
irrational utopian society as much as the next guy, but i don't think
humans will be capable of that for a long time. One mans utopia is
another mans dystopia. That doesn't mean we can't create a system that
is pretty fucking good though, and a hell of a lot better than the
current one in place.
Why is buying fresh organic food harder
than buying GMO's and other processed foods? And why are there so many
government laws that go against small farmers? We really can't grow our
own godamn food now?Since when do these psychos think they own the
earth? It's almost laughable, then you realize it's the real situation.
Fuck this society, it's collapse is inevitable.
I know there's a
bunch of grammatical errors and non linear thoughts there, but it's
certainly some stuff to think about i guess.
Some more food for
thought, the majority of scientists think liberally minded. One of the
most respected scientists, carl sagan thought this way. Just read
cosmos. :) And listen to neal degrass tyson, very smart man.
Ah
the voice of a human with the heart of an artist in moral
outrage. Always wonderful to hear! This is the voice of our
collective conscience, reminding us of our responsibilities to the
planet and each other. Give 'em hell friend!
You make many
good points here. The bottom line is I agree with you
largely. Our system must make room for the intellecual free
thinker and yes the classic starving artist.
These folks
are in 2 category. They have the ability to be very productive in a
market economy, but are unmotivated to do so. Please don't
mistake my saying this as passing judgement, rather I suggest that
people of this ilk are making a moral and informed decision not to
participate, and many of these people enrich our culture if not our
wallets.
Thus again...the safety net has purpose here, we
must be willing to support these type of people. Lest their
creative genious be turned toward ill ends. I've known people whom
were artists, and parents, and they railed against "the system", but
when they had a baby, well...they needed medical support and feasted on
government cheese. I loved their art and I loved them.
You
also point out that the system allows devious an those with ill intent
to rob and plunder. Indeed, this is true, and is a short
coming. However, it is IMO, a necessary evil. The
accumulation of wealth (illicit or otherwise) is necessary for the
overall exercise. The ones and twos will be able to be fed and
clothed from the treasure the government forcibly extracts from these
folks.
BTW: Another important point in my worldview is that
we must have a system that allows the advance of science. Our
world is doomed, and this is just a fact. Perhaps we will do
it (global warming, nucluear war, biological disaster), or perhaps it
will be natural (massive commet, gamma ray burst, super-volcano, coronal
mass ejection). Which means that we must get the hell off this
planet and begin colonizing other worlds, and as soon as possible.
I agree whole heartedly with Carl Sagan's characterization of
humanity, we are the universe "woken up" and just beginning to regard
itself. Humanity is therefore precious. We must not let
ourselves be extinguised. We're very groovy. :-)
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Absolutely love this thread.
The fact is, the ideas brought
forward as ideal "libertarianism" today are incredibly naive, simplistic
and in many ways as deluded as religions in that they all "believe" in
this invisible, intangible, unprovable "force" that will make everything
right for everyone - namely, Adam Smith's invisible hand.
Libertarians
today subscribe to this simpleton logic that "Ponderosa Ranch sells bad
steaks, people will stop buying steaks from Ponderosa Ranch" as
cure-it-all for any and all market failures. Obviously, this idea falls
flat on it's nose as soon as the Ponderosa Ranch has enough liquid
assets to spend on making sure their "bad steaks" aren't being exposed
to the public, to hire "crisis managers" and "social media monitors" to
mitigate the impact of "bad publicity". OP's observation that what
people think would be working libertarianism is just as poppycock as
communism is one of the sharpest observations and parallels I've seen on
here in a while.... big +1.
I have for a very long time felt
that those favoring extreme libertarianism in societies with extreme
labor division simply lack the perspective to understand just how many
"victims" their preferred form of market Darwinism would produce, and
worse, how severe these failings would impact the affected.
Your life savings gone because some financial sheister screwed you? Your fault, you should have informed yourself better.
But
please do tell how is a carpenter, electrician, HVAC maintenance guy
etc. to inform himself in a subject matter so complex that even those
within the industry don't understand the complexity of the instruments
they trade. 2007 crash anyone?
Adam Smith is by and large
considered the "father" of capitalism, and Wealth of Nations -
particularly division of labor - is one of the most quoted works on
capitalism still today. However, a lot of those purporting to be
"libertarian" today will usually quote from the first half of the book,
presumably because they don't like that even Adam Smith, father of
capitalism himself, stipulated that the division of labor will reach a
point where an external force (government, regulation) will be needed to
maintain a healthy balance of interests.
Anyways, short on time just now but I'll sure be back for more....
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1) If people aren't ready to compete or work hard, then why would you give them shit for free?
2)
disabled people or people whom can't work, there are not a ton of those
people, if you have proper definitions of what is considered disabled
(not being able to dial a phone number is enough to get a disabled
sticker on your car) then you cut the number of disabled down A LOT. So
those people can be taken care of via other means.
3) People
wouldn't need a safety-net, because you wouldn't be reliant on
businesses to hire you. You could sell drugs, you could start up a
service (be it car repair or whatever you want) If you are working for
someone else and you get downsized or w/e you take what you learned from
that business and start a competing business or a start up. If people
aren't willing to do that, then they have to deal with that choice, why
is my responsibility to make people happy or not poor?
I don't
have all the answers or a solution for every problem, but I know
hundreds, if not thousands of people whom have really good ideas, but
can't do it because it takes so much money to even start a business. Get
rid of the regulatory system and you will see business boom and
unemployment drop to nearly zero. Will there be tragedy of the commons
issues? absolutely, but just like anything else, people have a way to
fix those issues. The market will find the bad businesses and destroy
them then good business will thrive! There would be no LLC, no CORP
protection. no government to protect big business interest, lobbying
would die and businesses would thrive.
I'd rather go through growing pangs in a free market than the system we have now.
Interesting points, responded to in order:
1)
Because otherwise they may organize themselves into a violent mob and
take it from you (destroying all in their path on the way). The
French revolution is a cautionary tale here. Also, we do have a
moral imperative to care for those in our society whom are unable (and
yes unwilling) to care for themselves. We are human beings, and
reciprocal altruism is at the heart of how our minds evolved to
work. We also therefore expect that should we fall, our neighbors
will not sit idly by, they would carry us. Thus we are willing to
carry others.
2) Yes there are always freeloaders, and they
should not be coddled. It should not be easy or sexy to get
government cheese. It must be however possible.
3) If only
this were true. However even in a world of totally unfettered
capatalism, there are many whom simply could not comete (again either
willfully or not). Keep in mind, half of everyone is below average
intelligence, and even those at the half point up...may not be willing
to do so (for whatever reason). Dismissing thier needs would be
dangerous, and morally questionable. Government is the means by
which we as a community implement our decision to care for these people.
I
also know a lot of people with good ideas, grand dreams and
aspirations. I have them too. However, I soon forget about
them and end up riding my bike or watching TV. This puts me
solidly in the 3 category, I work, but not too hard, and I'd be a
terrible business person (I'm just not that motivated by money).
It's those 4s that are the engines of business...and if your friends
were 4s..they cut through that red tape and make it happen (others have,
and what one man can do another can do...given the drive and
intelligence).
-
Sorry,
but aside from the illegality of selling drugs, what exactly are these
'huge barriers to entry' for starting a new business that you believe
aren't currently possible under the current western system?
(+1 for you, Reason. A nicely reasoned, non-dogmatic dialogue starter!)
If
you operate a Bitcoin exchange you need to know my customers. Running a
digital currency exchange in the USA is begging to go to prison even if
you try to follow the law. You need to figure out how much tax you owe,
etc. If you make a new drug it needs to be approved by the FDA. There
are regulations and laws galore, you are naive as hell if you think
drugs being illegal to sell is the only way that the government
strangles businesses.
Firstly, thanks Yowie!
Secondly,
there are always barriers to entry into a market. Surely the
government puts them there, but so do competitors. The bottom line
is that market is about whom can overcome and compete most effectively
in the given environment. Surely we'd not complain that an
American Nija Warrior (a popular show I'm told) has to surmount too many
obstacles to win. It's part of the game!
-
People
of #2 are the reason why the rest suffer. In any economy that you
structure, those people would be the ones you'd have to work around the
most.
...
There are Engineers making the next product, who
will be outearned by a CEO who studied buisness and had a few connects.
Clearly hard work does not always equate.
Honestly, although I
enjoyed your post, it's very black/white, which is inherently the
problem with non-dynamic government systems.
Some very thoughtful insights.
I'd
first say that passing judgement on everyone in the number two category
as being "bad" is likely inaccurate. As I mentioned in another
response, many of these people are artists, intellectuals, religious
followers (idiots...I do pass judgment on these leeches...ugh don't get
me started. Religion is one of our biggest problems...but I'll
save that for another post), and yes...just lazy people. The point
is...that just because these people don't contribute to wealth, they
may contribute in other ways. Regardless....wishing them away will
not work. We must rationally acknowledge they exist, and find a
way of integrating them effectively into society.
As to the CEO
making more than the brilliant engineer, well...if the engineer is so
brilliant and wants what the CEO has...why haven't they simply taken the
steps to become the CEO and displace that dolt?! The answer...is
that it takes a certain set of skills and intelectual abilities to
become a rock-star CEO. These people (4s) are paid the way they
are, because they have made money for the stockholders of the
company. The government must be there to forcibly extract some
money from the company and the CEO to pay for the 1s and 2s. The
brilliant engineer is solidly in the 3 category, but is free to go for
the green. But they are also free to just bitch about things over
beer with their buddies. I'll drink to that too!
-
This is directly from aynrandlexicon.org, the book Atlas Shrugged is
great but it is a slow start, once it gets going momentum wise it is
actually quite good:
At
a sales conference at Random House, preceding the publication of Atlas
Shrugged, one of the book salesmen asked me whether I could present the
essence of my philosophy while standing on one foot. I did as follows:
Metaphysics: Objective Reality
Epistemology: Reason
Ethics: Self-interest
Politics: Capitalism
If
you want this translated into simple language, it would read: 1.
“Nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed” or “Wishing won’t make it so.”
2. “You can’t eat your cake and have it, too.” 3. “Man is an end in
himself.” 4. “Give me liberty or give me death.”
If you held
these concepts with total consistency, as the base of your convictions,
you would have a full philosophical system to guide the course of your
life. But to hold them with total consistency—to understand, to define,
to prove and to apply them—requires volumes of thought. Which is why
philosophy cannot be discussed while standing on one foot—nor while
standing on two feet on both sides of every fence. This last is the
predominant philosophical position today, particularly in the field of
politics.
My philosophy, Objectivism, holds that:
Reality exists as an objective absolute—facts are facts, independent of man’s feelings, wishes, hopes or fears.
Reason
(the faculty which identifies and integrates the material provided by
man’s senses) is man’s only means of perceiving reality, his only source
of knowledge, his only guide to action, and his basic means of
survival.
Man—every man—is an end in himself, not the means to
the ends of others. He must exist for his own sake, neither sacrificing
himself to others nor sacrificing others to himself. The pursuit of his
own rational self-interest and of his own happiness is the highest moral
purpose of his life.
The ideal political-economic system is
laissez-faire capitalism. It is a system where men deal with one
another, not as victims and executioners, nor as masters and slaves, but
as traders, by free, voluntary exchange to mutual benefit. It is a
system where no man may obtain any values from others by resorting to
physical force, and no man may initiate the use of physical force
against others. The government acts only as a policeman that protects
man’s rights; it uses physical force only in retaliation and only
against those who initiate its use, such as criminals or foreign
invaders. In a system of full capitalism, there should be (but,
historically, has not yet been) a complete separation of state and
economics, in the same way and for the same reasons as the separation of
state and church.
-
*All links clearnet*
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0480239/
Atlas Shrugged: Part I
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1985017/
Atlas Shrugged II: The Strike
Just see the movies. Then read the best parts of the book such as the Money Speech.
http://capitalismmagazine.com/2002/08/franciscos-money-speech/
Rand
was a terrible writer but her thoughts about business and self interest
are completely untouchable. Atlas Shrugged wasn't just a book she took
10 years to write. It's also a prophecy. One that's already come true in
Detroit and in the process of coming true all across America and
Europe.
-
Rand was a terrible writer but her thoughts about business and self interest are completely untouchable.
Bullshit.
She was a downright weirdo who thought the ultimate "superman" was the
child kidnapper/murderer she fell in love with.
I'm not even making this up.
-
From the Money Speech:
"Money is the barometer of a society’s
virtue. When you see that trading is done, not by consent, but by
compulsion–when you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain
permission from men who produce nothing–when you see that money is
flowing to those who deal, not in goods, but in favors–when you see that
men get richer by graft and by pull than by work, and your laws don’t
protect you against them, but protect them against you–when you see
corruption being rewarded and honesty becoming a self-sacrifice–you may
know that your society is doomed."
It's really amazing how spot
on she was about the future. Society here IS doomed. Capitalism in
America and most of Europe is already dead. We just don't know it yet.
Keep on slinging mud and rocks at Rand! Doesn't make her any less truthful or right.
Child murderer? Really??? Was she the first member of Al Qaeda too? ;D ::)
-
It happens to be true. Try reading a biography on your hero.
Yes, SHE NOTICED THE CONTRADICTION OF CAPITALISM. Congratulations.
PS, Marx noted it too, noted it more eloquently, noted it with better research, and with more impact. Oh, and first.
-
SHE NOTICED THE CONTRADICTION OF CAPITALISM.
Under Capitalism, man exploits man. Under Communism it's the other way around.
-
Rocknessie +1000
Ayn Rand was a semi-psychotic whackjob on speed. Just watch her in interviews on youtube, certifiable amph'ed out psycho.
Quality criteria that made you a "hero" in Rand's eyes:
a) Have a lot of money
b) Shit on those that have less money than you
c) Don't in any way associate with or recognize the benefits of government
Meaning,
the sheister banksters that crashed the world economy in 06/07/09 she
would have been perfectly fine with, after all, they didn't use a bat or
a gun to get their way, which were her sole simpleton criteria of
defining "force"...
As for Atlas shrugged, one of the worst
contrived, long-winded, pseudo-allegorical, (unintentionally)
simplistic, badly written pieces in the history of writing itself.
-
SHE NOTICED THE CONTRADICTION OF CAPITALISM.
Under Capitalism, man exploits man. Under Communism it's the other way around.
E for effort.
The
contradiction of Capitalism is Capital is able to organise more
effectively than Labour, as Capital is able to purchase the judicial
system, political system, the media. Having established dominance
Capital then seeks to increase itself though increased profits by
activities such as lowering wages in real terms. So the workers are
being paid less but required to buy as much and even encouraged to buy
more, Credit is great for this. It then happens eventually the workers
are unable to afford the goods and the system collapses.
There you go. The Contradiction of Capitalism in one paragraph.
PS. Even ADAM SMITH noticed it, as a consequence he was in favour of heavily regulated Capitalism.
-
Ann Rand
William
Edward Hickman stated in 1928, "I am like the state: what is good for
me is right." Rand wrote in her journal regarding his statement "The
best and strongest expression of a real man's psychology I have heard."
Hickman made quite an impression on Rand, because she deliberately
modeled Danny Renahan, the hero of a planned novel titled The Little
Street, on Hickman, according to Rand scholar Chris Matthew Sciabarra.
Rand also wrote regarding Renahan, "Other people do not exist for him
and he does not understand why they should."
By now you might
assume that Hickman was a great philosopher or something like that. The
Malefactor's Register and Fate, Death and The Fox documented the grisly
reality.
In Los Angeles on 12/15/1927, the 19-year-old Hickman
told the 12-year-old Marion Parker's school principal that her father
had become seriously ill. The principal allowed Hickman to take her even
though he had asked for “the younger daughter,” clearly ignorant of the
fact that she was a twin. Hickman sent a letter to her father demanding
money, a price was agreed upon, and a rendezvous was set. Her father
gave $1500 to Hickman who was waiting for him in a Ford roadster. Her
father saw his daughter in a package showing only her head on the
passenger seat next to Hickman; her father assumed she had been
chloroformed. After Hickman received the money, he drove down the block
with Marion still in the car. Hickman stopped, pushed her out of the
car, and drove away. Her father ran to her and only then realized that
the package only contained her head and torso. Hickman had cut off her
arms and legs and removed her internal organs and replaced them with
rags. Her back showed signs of flogging. Marion’s arms and legs were
later found in a park, wrapped in newspaper.
This was Rand's
"real man," someone who kidnapped a 12-year-old girl, almost certainly
raped her, and butchered her like a farm animal. One can only hope he
killed her before butchering her, but one report stated that he believed
she was alive when he began to dismember her.
Rand expressed
contempt for those who disliked her heroic killer: "The first thing that
impresses me about the case is the ferocious rage of a whole society
against one man. No matter what the man did, there is always something
loathsome in the 'virtuous' indignation and mass-hatred of the
'majority' . . . It is repulsive to see all these beings with worse sins
and crimes in their own lives, virtuously condemning a criminal."
Source of the article, clearweb, includes other clearweb links giving citations of various facts:
http://saucymugwump.blogspot.co.uk/2009/11/alan-greenspan-ayn-rand-and-child.html
Another one:
The
mutilations Hickman inflicted on little Marian were worse than reported
in the excerpt above. He cut the girl’s body in half, and severed her
hands (or arms, depending on the source). He drained her torso of blood
and stuffed it with bath towels.
…
In her notes, Rand complains that poor Hickman has become the target of irrational and ugly mob psychology:
“The
first thing that impresses me about the case is the ferocious rage of a
whole society against one man. No matter what the man did, there is
always something loathsome in the ‘virtuous’ indignation and mass-hatred
of the ‘majority.’… It is repulsive to see all these beings with worse
sins and crimes in their own lives, virtuously condemning a criminal…
“This
is not just the case of a terrible crime. It is not the crime alone
that has raised the fury of public hatred. It is the case of a daring
challenge to society. It is the fact that a crime has been committed by
one man, alone; that this man knew it was against all laws of humanity
and intended that way; that he does not want to recognize it as a crime
and that he feels superior to all. It is the amazing picture of a man
with no regard whatever for all that society holds sacred, and with a
consciousness all his own. A man who really stands alone, in action and
in soul.”
CLEARLINK WARNING #2, https://francoistremblay.wordpress.com/2010/07/17/ayn-rands-love-of-a-serial-killer/
Anyone
who is a fan of rape-fiction author Ann Rand (ever try reading her sex
scenes?) is someone you do not want to babysit any of your children.
-
I've
now concluded that Libertariansim is a lot like Communism, they both
look pretty good on paper, but neither adequately incorporates certain
realities of human nature. In fact, they both have the same basic
failing, they assume too much uniformity in the human condition, and are
too optimistic about that condition.
Bingo. Same reason I no longer identify with libertarianism.
Like Marget Thatcher once said, "Socialism is great, until you run out of other people's money."
Or another famous Brit, Churchill said, "Capitalism is the worst form of government. Until you've tried all the rest."
-
Rocknessie +1000
Ayn Rand was a semi-psychotic whackjob on speed. Just watch her in interviews on youtube, certifiable amph'ed out psycho.
Quality criteria that made you a "hero" in Rand's eyes:
a) Have a lot of money
b) Shit on those that have less money than you
c) Don't in any way associate with or recognize the benefits of government
Meaning,
the sheister banksters that crashed the world economy in 06/07/09 she
would have been perfectly fine with, after all, they didn't use a bat or
a gun to get their way, which were her sole simpleton criteria of
defining "force"...
As for Atlas shrugged, one of the worst
contrived, long-winded, pseudo-allegorical, (unintentionally)
simplistic, badly written pieces in the history of writing itself.
This
is a bit of an ad-hominem attack on her ideals. Her ideal person is
simply one who is productive and makes no sacrifices (her definition of
sacrifice probably differs than what most people have in mind). She was
not against helping people, she was against helping someone out of a
sense of duty or because "you had to".
Understanding Atlas
Shrugged properly you would see that being "wealthy" was not necessary
to fit that ideal persona, many of the railroad workers during the
crisis were shown as great individuals, albeit without wealth.
She
would not have condoned the behavior of the banksters having to do with
the economical crash. The banksters behaved in much the same way the
government subsidized organization in Atlas Shrugged behaved. Being
wealthy as a result of sucking the government's dick is not something
Rand would have looked highly upon. Furthermore, her definition of force
was not limited to physical force. For example, in the states we pay
taxes because we are forced; the IRS isn't going to beat the shit out of
you for not paying but depending on the amount, you could end up in
prison (that is the force). The bankers here were in bed with the gov't
and were using the monopoly on force that the government currently
holds.
Rand was also only opposed to government actions where
force is used. This would cover all forms of welfare and any other
government institutions that are funded through "forced" taxation. She
did recognize the need for government for the protection of individual
rights (aka courts, police, military, etc). In a government where its
only function is to protect individual rights a voluntary tax system
would likely be successful (I know I would pay a good 10-20% of my
income for my own protection).
Lastly, she did make some
mistakes in her personal life, no matter what mistakes she made, those
decisions are independent of the philosophy and ideals she developed. I
say, "murder is bad" if I go and kill someone, it does not make my
original statement of "murder is bad" less valid, it just makes me a
hypocrite at worst; the same can be applied to her.
P.S She did
apply and receive gov't benefits in her life, why? because under
objectivist ethics it is proper to reclaim taxes you were forced to pay
during your working life in the form of benefits. If at any point the
welfare you receive exceeds what you've been forced to pay, then it
become unethical.
-xoxo
-
Lastly,
she did make some mistakes in her personal life, no matter what
mistakes she made, those decisions are independent of the philosophy and
ideals she developed.
Absolutely
not. Her "mistakes" in her "personal life" were to praise the very
EPITOME of her philosophy. The trouble is the very epitome of her
philosophy EXACTLY IS the kind of guy who would abduct and dismember a
twelve year old girl.
-
What are your opinions on agorism and anarcho-capitalism?
-
Lastly,
she did make some mistakes in her personal life, no matter what
mistakes she made, those decisions are independent of the philosophy and
ideals she developed.
Absolutely
not. Her "mistakes" in her "personal life" were to praise the very
EPITOME of her philosophy. The trouble is the very epitome of her
philosophy EXACTLY IS the kind of guy who would abduct and dismember a
twelve year old girl.
Again,
while that is not very cool for her to praise the guy, and it has
served to discredit her, it does not change the merit of her work. Would
be the equivalent of, I dunno, say Jesus giving a high five to Hitler
(in some weird alternate universe). It would be really fucked up of him
to do and would go against his work, but it would not directly discredit
his arguments/miracles.
Yeah it really sucks that she was fond of that guy, but it does not change the merit of her political and ethical writings.
I
know where you are coming from though and actions like that are why it
has become hard for a lot of people to understand/accept objectivism. In
the end she, as a human, was fallible.
-
Rocknessie +1000
Ayn Rand was a semi-psychotic whackjob on speed. Just watch her in interviews on youtube, certifiable amph'ed out psycho.
Quality criteria that made you a "hero" in Rand's eyes:
a) Have a lot of money
b) Shit on those that have less money than you
c) Don't in any way associate with or recognize the benefits of government
Meaning,
the sheister banksters that crashed the world economy in 06/07/09 she
would have been perfectly fine with, after all, they didn't use a bat or
a gun to get their way, which were her sole simpleton criteria of
defining "force"...
As for Atlas shrugged, one of the worst
contrived, long-winded, pseudo-allegorical, (unintentionally)
simplistic, badly written pieces in the history of writing itself.
Actually
if not for the government the banks would have serious competition and
also would be prohibited from engaging in fractional reserve banking, so
it is actually the governments fault that the banksters crashed the
world economy.
-
Yeah it really sucks that she was fond of that guy, but it does not change the merit of her political and ethical writings.
It
does because her fondness for that guy was BASED on her ethnics and
philosophy.... praised of the unrestrained ego. She praised HIM and she
praised him for a reason. It wasn't she fell in love with a hunk with a
shady past. It was she loved him because he was the shining example of
her philosophy incarnate. That's the point. SHE was weird and nasty -
and so was her CREED.
And yes, as for your weird example, if
Jesus were to praise Hitler it would indeed discredit him as a universal
messiah. However, and at a tangent, him as a universal messiah is
discredited by his own Sermon on the Mount, the reference to "pearls
before swine, unholy before dogs" is not, as Christian apologist
reinterpret, Jesus telling his flock to not preach to the unconverted.
Both dogs and swine are Talmudic clichés for gentiles (the unclean).
Literally Jesus was telling his flock not to preach the world of the
Jewish god to non-Jews. The idea of Jesus as a messiah for non-Jews is
something Jesus never contemplated - it was something Paul got into for
there was lots of money in Greece.
-
Actually
if not for the government the banks would have serious competition and
also would be prohibited from engaging in fractional reserve banking, so
it is actually the governments fault that the banksters crashed the
world economy.
Do you have an EVIDENCE the lack of a rise of ethical, sustainable banking is due to any government preventing them?
Cite your working and evidence, please.
-
Actually
if not for the government the banks would have serious competition and
also would be prohibited from engaging in fractional reserve banking, so
it is actually the governments fault that the banksters crashed the
world economy.
Do you have an EVIDENCE the lack of a rise of ethical, sustainable banking is due to any government preventing them?
Cite your working and evidence, please.
It's
not that government prevented anything, it is that government provided
incentives for banks to practice unsustainable models (ie subprime
lending on a mass scale).
-
I guess this kind of "argument" shows the true desperation of Rand
haters. The Little Street was never finished and was only published
after her death. But whatever dirt you can dig up on her and anyone else
who disagrees with you right? Don't both to actually attack her
theories on money and business. Just tar and feather her instead.
Everyone
has done things that they're not proud of. EVERYONE. Especially a
young, depressed person alienated in a foreign country with barely a pot
to piss in. But I guess that's fair game to people like you. EVERYTHING
is fair game to a proud Communist ::) :o
http://freestudents.blogspot.ca/2010/03/smearing-ayn-rand-nietzsche-and.html
Clearnet: Smearing Ayn: Rand, Nietzsche and the Purposeless Monster
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=604618
Clearnet: Did Ayn Rand idolize a serial killer?
Source of the article, clearweb, includes other clearweb links giving citations of various facts:
http://saucymugwump.blogspot.co.uk/2009/11/alan-greenspan-ayn-rand-and-child.html
....
-
Actually
if not for the government the banks would have serious competition and
also would be prohibited from engaging in fractional reserve banking, so
it is actually the governments fault that the banksters crashed the
world economy.
Do you have an EVIDENCE the lack of a rise of ethical, sustainable banking is due to any government preventing them?
Cite your working and evidence, please.
It's
not that government prevented anything, it is that government provided
incentives for banks to practice unsustainable models (ie subprime
lending on a mass scale).
Not
even that, the sub-prime thing has been disproven as causal to the
crash. If anything it was a LACK of government regulation, quite the
opposite to too much government interference.
-
I guess you missed the blatant fact that the revolving door between
the banks and government is the largest open collaboration between
business and government there is.
Maybe you just aren't aware
that the current head of Goldman Sachs was secretly negotiating with the
former head of Goldman Sachs for who would survive and who wouldn't
after the financial crisis was over. That former head of Goldman Sachs
was the Secretary of the Treasury. Another former head of Goldman Sachs
was Jon Corzine, the former governor of New Jersey. Lookup MF Global
sometime. It's like a smaller version of Enron and Madoff put together.
But I don't think facts matter to you. I'm wasting my time just writing this.
Honestly why do I even bother? Hopefully this stuff won't fall completely on deaf ears in this thread.
Actually
if not for the government the banks would have serious competition and
also would be prohibited from engaging in fractional reserve banking, so
it is actually the governments fault that the banksters crashed the
world economy.
Do you have an EVIDENCE the lack of a rise of ethical, sustainable banking is due to any government preventing them?
Cite your working and evidence, please.
-
You're a funny guy! ;D ::)
Let me TRY to make it simple
for you: a lot of money was plowed into housing from 2000 until about
2007. A LOT of money. Trillions of dollars. Government and the Federal
Reserve ENCOURAGED it. In order to sell the mortgages on those
properties- behavior that is 100% encouraged by the Treasury-backed
government-sponsored enterprises (Fannie, Freddie and Ginnie)- the use
of derivatives was again ENCOURAGED. The government through these GSEs
was the biggest backer of mortgage-backed securities. They gave the
investment banks a huge amount of business during the housing bubble.
Other
kinds of derivatives were created to get through loopholes especially
crafted by the bankers best friends in government. The two types of
derivatives which directly caused the crisis were called Credit Default
Swaps and Collateralized Debt Obligations. Banks and other institutions
wrote CDS "insurance" on CDO derivatives which were really just a basket
of 3 different "slices" of mortgages. When housing prices took a big
hit, the CDOs took a much bigger hit. That's when the CDS insurance was
supposed to kick in. Too bad they were backed by little or nothing.
Anyone (every financial institution out there) holding a CDS received no
insurance at all. Anyone who wrote a CDS contract (every financial
institution out there) was on the hook for tens of billions of dollars
that were lost on the CDOs.
Who was the first casualty of all
this? Fannie Mae. The government decided to start a crisis specifically
designed to put more power in the hands of fewer commercial and
investment banks. Goldman Sachs #1. Treasury bailed Fannie out for 90
cents on the dollar- not completely so that it would set off a run on
all the CDS insurance on Fannie's paper. That's exactly what happened
and Goldman's biggest competitor Lehman was gone in a week. The rest of
the crisis followed and didn't end for another 6 months.
The
problem is not not NOT (!!!!!) the lack of regulation. It never was. The
problem is SELECTIVE regulation drafted and enforced under a gang of
fascists and armed thugs. If you're part of the government's revolving
door, special boy's club you're fine. If you're not then you're fucking
dead meat if they want you to be. It's just that simple.
Asking the government to solve this problem or pretty much any other is like asking Richard Ramirez for a haircut.
I probably made a big mistake by even posting this.... Hopefully not.
Not
even that, the sub-prime thing has been disproven as causal to the
crash. If anything it was a LACK of government regulation, quite the
opposite to too much government interference.
-
In a more layman style of argument. Notice the banks that didn't
need bailing out....to my knowledge they are also the banks that are
least involved with the gov't. What happened there was similar to Atlas
Shrugged and the businesses that survived only because of favorable
regulation, business that would have otherwise died on merit alone.
Like
Baraka said, instead of attacking the person it would be nice for you
to address specific theories/arguments that she made. aynrandlexicon.org
(clearnet) is a good place where you can find her stuff in an organized
fashion.
-
What are your opinions on agorism and anarcho-capitalism?
Hi Mr. Gonzo,
Thanks
for asking (as it made me look up both terms...I love learning new
things!). Hmmm..well based on the two definitions in WikiPedia,
which are:
"Agorists consider themselves market anarchists, while
many characterize it as a form of left-libertarianism.[2] Agorists
generally oppose voting for political candidates and political reform.
Instead, agorists stress the importance of alternative strategies rather
than politics to achieve a free society. Agorists claim that we can
achieve a free society more easily and sooner by employing such
alternative methods as education, direct action, alternative currencies,
entrepreneurship, self sufficiency, and most importantly
"counter-economics".[1] Agorists consider their message to be scientific
because science is an appeal to reason, which they believe is only
possible in the Agora or free market. Agorists believe that State
backed, regulated and funded science is illegitimate.[3]"
"[anarcho-capitalism]
...is a political philosophy which advocates the elimination of the
state in favor of individual sovereignty in a free market.[4][5] In an
anarcho-capitalist society, law enforcement, courts, and all other
security services would be provided by privately funded competitors
rather than through taxation, and money would be privately and
competitively provided in an open market. Therefore, personal and
economic activities under anarcho-capitalism would be regulated by
privately run law rather than through politics."
I guess the fact
that I use SR, would suggest that at least I'm not wholly opposed to
many of the ideas in Agorism (if we agree that counter-economics is the
study and practice of engaging in the market of things forbidden by the
government). Still, there are some things that are forbidden, that
I'd not be interested in studying or in practicing (weird pedo porn, or
nuclear weapons for example). I also would have to say that a
great deal of basic science would not be pursued if not supported by the
government (as there is very little profit in basic science, although
basic science is needed to make the breakthroughs which eventually turn
into goods and services). Therefore I consider basic science what
Adam Smith called an externality to the market, and an appropriate area
of government involvement.
As for the anarcho-capitalism,
well...it sort of sounds like mob rule (with various private police
forces being paid to enforce someone's version of the law for
profit). I think this is probably how some of the old fiefdoms
ran, as there were armies which could be rented for various engagements
by various govenors or dukes. Sounds kinda scary in truth.
-
I
guess you missed the blatant fact that the revolving door between the
banks and government is the largest open collaboration between business
and government there is.
Not at all. I get that fully. My counterpoint is THE BANKS RUN THE GOVERNMENT, NOT THE OTHER WAY ROUND.
A
head of a bank is there for decades. A President just just a guy who
spends his entire life getting into a job he might have just have four
years at. And Presidential candidate CANNOT get elected without the
backing of Capital in some form. But in a Globalised Market world the
banks CAN move their Capital to wherever they like.
And it's been
that way since, well, certainly in American since just before the first
world war... (a war which was, of course, completely created and
maintained by private capital - not by states or governments).
-
THE BANKS RUN THE GOVERNMENT, NOT THE OTHER WAY ROUND.
Agreed completely 100%. Did you think I somehow meant something else in my postings??
And Presidential candidate CANNOT get elected without the backing of Capital in some form.
From
the end of the Money Speech: "Until and unless you discover that money
is the root of all good, you ask for your own destruction. When money
ceases to be the tool by which men deal with one another, then men
become the tools of men. Blood, whips and guns–or dollars. Take your
choice–there is no other–and your time is running out."
Can you
give me an example of a world leader who ISN'T backed by capital in some
form? Whether they get it willingly or by force, all leaders are backed
by capital. That's where the blood, whips, guns or dollars come from.
....a war which was, of course, completely created and maintained by private capital
And
which war WASN'T completely created and maintained by private capital?
Again whether it's done willingly or through theft (taxation, inflation
and just plain seizure), war is not possible without capital. All of
that capital is then destroyed in said war making war truly the most
destructive thing ever devised. Right on par with the current banking
system ;)
-
So many thoughtful and interesting comments and questions! Many thanks to you all for engaging in this fun exercise.
Hey Reason, what are your thoughts on a stateless society? Any speculation on why it may or may not work?
I'm
uncertain that this would work. My primary concern is that
government (good government) provides a great deal of structure within
which humans can conduct themselves safely, in other words rule of
law. Without rule of law, we bascially have mob justice, and might
makes right, and this would not allow non-violent people to be able to
excel. This may seem odd coming from a SR user, however, I
honestly believe that a large part of my willingness to participate is
an act of civil disobedience. I don't agree with the law in this
case and actively try to change it and defy it. I do however
respect the concept of rule of law.
Complete freedom has no rules on behavior at all, and would descend into a lord of the flies world. Not attractive IMO.
How
does this differ from a the state which is a violent enforcement? The
state that we inherited from ancient Greece thousands of years ago might
not be the best way to run a modern society. There has to be a better
way IMO. However, if anybody points out that the State is violent,
they're told is voluntary. If anybody says we shouldn't have the
violence if it's voluntary, then they're told the violence is necessary.
Sounds like the hallmark of sociopathy and the lie told to steal your
resources.
I think the state is exactly the result of
propaganda, which is why you need public schools. Nobody wakes up
believing that we need a monopoly of violence, that we can protect our
property by giving a monopoly to violent people who can strip us of it,
who can protect our freedom by giving a monopoly to violent people who
can incarcerate and torture us at will. None of that makes any sense at
all.
-
+1
Fucking fantastic post! Thank you :)
And btw
if the police ever kill on the job they get away with it 999 times out
of 1000. In the very rare event that they're sued and the victim's
family wins guess who pays? WE DO. The taxpayers always cover murder "in
the public interest" on their dime. That is some sick shit right
there!!! >:( :o
How
does this differ from a the state which is a violent enforcement? The
state that we inherited from ancient Greece thousands of years ago might
not be the best way to run a modern society. There has to be a better
way IMO. However, if anybody points out that the State is violent,
they're told is voluntary. If anybody says we shouldn't have the
violence if it's voluntary, then they're told the violence is necessary.
Sounds like the hallmark of sociopathy and the lie told to steal your
resources.
I think the state is exactly the result of
propaganda, which is why you need public schools. Nobody wakes up
believing that we need a monopoly of violence, that we can protect our
property by giving a monopoly to violent people who can strip us of it,
who can protect our freedom by giving a monopoly to violent people who
can incarcerate and torture us at will. None of that makes any sense at
all.
-
Derailed thread derails fast.
Back to why Ayn Rand's
pseudo-philosophy is poppycock. Ayn Rand categorically detested all
forms of altruism. And therein lies the crux. At the current stage of
scientific knowledge and commonly accepted theories in many different
disciplines we are hardwired to be altruistic, some more some less.
For
example, a number of neurobiology studies have found that altruistic
behavior lights up the mesolimbic system (for the junkies in here, yep,
that's the same part that makes coke feel so nice), thus, altruism is
not a "failed social construct" as objectivists would stipulate, but in
fact an evolutionary trait. Matter of fact, some biologists make a
strong case that altruism is at the base of evolutionary reciprocity,
which would in turn mean that without biologically hardwired altruism
our species wouldn't worry about John Galt making money but rather about
finding the next ant mound to lick some critters off a stick like our
ape cousins.
In Rand's opinion altruism is a case of "failed"
identity, identity being her warped perception of this conflated sum of
self-interest actions and "rational" conclusions.
What I am
saying is, her "philosophy" is completely and utterly debunked in that
she misunderstands biologically hardwired evolutionary functions of our
species as "identity-less whim-worship".
Way I see it, the woman
was tremendously butthurt by communism in her own country, so she
started writing these coked/amph'ed up "philosophy" pamphlets that
really aren't much more than stipulations of the direct opposite of
communism, which is of course a far cry from being an actual
"philosophy" even remotely able to survive Hume's Guillotine.
-
Agreed.
Saw a great documentary on Game Theory. The presenter
talked to the creator of Game Theory (the theory that all humans act
aggressively - in naked self interest - towards all other humans all the
time, creating equilibrium) and asked "what about altruism".
He paused for about a third of a second, grinned, and replied "I have no idea how to model that".
Which is a shame given how influential his ghastly ideas have been.
-
All good points. I said from first time I mentioned Rand earlier in
this thread that her thoughts on money, business and self interest are
untouchable. That Atlas Shrugged was a prophecy that has come true. When
she starts talking about altruism things start getting messy. And
messier still when talking about Objectivism. That's something I
definitely don't subscribe to and I'm no atheist either which any real
Objectivist MUST be. The worst were her views on Israel and the current
views of the Ayn Rand Institute on Israel and its enemies. They're all
out batshit crazy on that stuff.
Guess I should've said that I'm
no worshipper of Rand-- except when it comes to business. Then again I
wouldn't have had the fun of reading the responses of how my she's my
"hero" and that I'm just a zombie who parrots everything she had to
say ;D :P
Getting back to altruism, Rand made a lot of good
points about how some form of altruism was instrumental to the regimes
of Hitler, Stalin and most other mass murderers. What she was really
talking about was state-sponsored altruism which is the worst of the
worst. Too bad she didn't stop there. She applied her beliefs to ALL
forms of altruism. Although she made a good point about no animal being
able to survive if it helped every other animal but itself first, she
struggled to make the same distinction with human beings. She also
struggled to justify how caring and giving up for another in a
relationship somehow WASN'T altruism. She made it seem like it was an
type of exchange within the relationship. Really weak reasoning and I've
never bought it.
I don't blame her though. She witnessed
firsthand how people she knew in Russia were slaughtered by Communist
thugs like they were pieces of trash. She saw how the government twisted
people's beliefs into buying into the state's version of altruism
(which always involved coercion, force, theft, torture and killing)- all
for the "public good" of course. A term Rand uses again and again and
again. Altruism is still often used today by both parties to justify
giving up money, freedom, privacy and many other rights for the "public
good". You'll be hearing a lot more about that in the coming days when
the next war in the middle east starts.
-
I agree Chil, it's an unfortunate truth that many people just don't have it goin' on.
I
worked the polls for the Libertarian party one year, and this was the
beginning of the end for me. I was absolutely blown away by the
ignorance (willfull, or not) of the vast majority of the voters. I
desperately tried to engage people in thoughtful discussion, but was
dismayed that most people didn't know what the Bill of Rights was, nor
how many branches of government we have, nor even how many states there
were.
They didn't even really know why they were voting
the way they did...most just came for the free donuts. They all
however voted that day.
It was quite enlightening. It gave me a new appreciation of our system (flawed though it is).
Hope
this wasn't for the presidential race..... If you dedicate time to that
endeavor then you are an idiot. Americans voting in the general
presidential election are wasting there energy as those votes
don't even really count. Presidential elections are nothing more than a
boat and pony show to keep us quiet. Americans don't choose the
President, the fucking electoral college does. And the good people of
Washington DC get to pay taxes and don't get a presidential vote so
anyone paying taxes in DC is fucking stupid too. You are taxed without
ANY representation AT ALL and don't even get to participate in the FAKE
ELECTIONS held every 4 years. Wake up people..... Voting for the
president is like picking out a new pope. You have nothing to do with it
and it is nothing more than a show for the people.
This
is true. Did you know EVERY SINGLE president except for 1 is related by
blood? Direct relations. Now that is no way a fucking coincidence.
There was a young girl i think she was around 12 or 13 and for her
school project she decided to research her president's family
tree(obama) and found out he was related to them all, Search for it now
if you dont believe me.
Obama is the most fake president ever. there are way too many reasons to name but here's a few that really piss me off.
His
main slogan was "change", and yet he still implements sanctions on
other countries and policies created by george bush SR. no the last one,
His fucking dad.
he promised to welcome whistleblowers and offer
them security, he said that they will be protected and are doing the
right thing by exposing crimes, Well I guess that only counts if the
crimes they expose are made by anyone bar the government. The obama
administration has prosecuted more whistleblowers than EVERY OTHER
presidency combined!
What a fucking joke.
-
All arguments are moot.
Theft cannot be justified. No matter
the reasoning. You're all the debating on how the system would work
(and a lot of wacky conspiracy shit)
But what it really boils
down to is that one person should not be able to steal from another.
(taxes). Those of you who can't look after yourselves and want a
safety-bracket are more than welcome to join a anarcho-socialist
society. Just don't force me to participate.
Once you realise
that taxation is theft, and the non-aggression principle (The
non-aggression principle (NAP)—also called the non-aggression axiom, the
zero aggression principle (ZAP), the anti-coercion principle, or the
non-initiation of force—is a moral stance which asserts that aggression
is inherently illegitimate. NAP and property rights are closely linked,
since what aggression is depends on what a person's rights are.[1]
Aggression, for the purposes of NAP, is defined as the initiation or
threatening of violence against a person or legitimately-owned property
of another. Specifically, any unsolicited actions of others that
physically affect an individual’s property or person, no matter if the
result of those actions is damaging, beneficial, or neutral to the
owner, are considered violent or aggressive when they are against the
owner's free will and interfere with his right to self-determination and
the principle of self-ownership.) is the only correct way for humans to
co-exist. The rest will fall into place
-
Except taxes are not theft. They are a pool of resource needed for the common good.
In
the Libertarian world my partner - ill with Multiple Sclerosis -
wouldn't die. No. She'd be on a path of increasing, permanent,
disability because I can't afford to purchase the thousands of pounds
worth of medicine she takes each and every month. Basically blind in a
wheelchair, with increasing pain. She worked before illness, I worked a
well paying job for decades. For years and years each of us put into the
system vastly more than either of us ever withdrew. It would have been
fine with each of us if neither of us ever saw "value" for that
taxation. But as she's the "lucky" one in a million to come down with a
horrific illness it's nice that social pool of tax money is available.
And
no, the money alone we put in wouldn't have been enough to cover all
the costs. That's the point of spreading the cost over a larger user
base. The larger the base the lower any individual contribution.
Fairness would suggest the richer paid more than the poorer, as I did.
Progressive taxation is the pinnacle of an insurance scheme like that.
This
is, ultimately, why Libertarianism is a load of wank that only healthy
young people straight from momma's spare room seem to guzzle up.
Oh
yes, your taxation also pays for the jails and the police. No taxation
and the cops go home and the prisoners get let out. I don't give three
flying fucks how hard you say or think you are, that's a lot arse rape
you have to face immediately prior to the *ACTUAL* theft of *ALL* your
good shit. And, with a bleeding anus no hospital will treat, and no
possessions, just you wait till they light your home on fire.
No
Libertarian fireman is going to come out and put out that fire out of a
sense of altruism... and you don't got shit to PAY with... so he'll
SHRUG LIKE ATLAS and watch that motherfucker BURN!
This is not to
say there is nothing about Libertarianism that's worthwhile. But it's
like any doctrine or creed - Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism,
Capitalism, Communism, whatever, - the fanatics are destructive
weirdoes. Always. Because they're fanatic. And weird.
-
Except taxes are not theft. They are a pool of resource needed for the common good.
By
common good do you mean funding wars to the tune of billions of dollars
a year, including the war on drugs in the US, the maintenance of
prisons where a huge chunk of the population are innocent people
incarcerated for victimless crimes directly resulting from the war on
drugs, public education, an enterprise which consistently fails to do
what it sets out to do and the crumbling infrastructure? Sorry man, but
you need to get your head out of your ass.
Taxation is Coercion.
If you do not pay your taxes, you are kidnapped at gunpoint, and you
are throw in jail, where if you try to escape, you are shot. I don't
know how you are able to be honest with yourself and try to justify
that.
-
By
common good do you mean funding wars to the tune of billions of dollars
a year, including the war on drugs in the US, the maintenance of
prisons where a huge chunk of the population are innocent...
The
majority of prisoners are very guilty, and guilty of some horrific
crimes, including murder and rape, sometimes multiples of each.
You're
arguing we should have no healthcare provision, no firemen, no prisons,
etc., on the grounds some of the money is also used to start wars?
Interesting. But that is not the Jedi way.
Taxation
is Coercion. If you do not pay your taxes, you are kidnapped at
gunpoint, and you are throw in jail, where if you try to escape, you are
shot. I don't know how you are able to be honest with yourself and try
to justify that.
I'll re-justify it to you... each and every time I see my partner and she's not in a wheelchair.
-
Except taxes are not theft. They are a pool of resource needed for the common good.
-Snip-
Sorry to hear about your partner mate. It's a bitch of a disease :(
And,
agreed again. Taxes are theft is one of these ridiculous tenets I will
never understand. How narrow-minded does one have to be to subscribe to
it? In the US they have this saying that goes "Republicans are democrats
after being mugged", I'd go one further and say "libertarians are
republicans that haven't been kicked in the groin by life yet" ...
To
believe that Shell/BP/Exxon would stop polluting for any other reason
than government sanctions is ridiculous, just look at Southern Africa.
To think that big corp would fund a proper school system for all out of
"self-interest" is laughable, just look at Nevada. To think that big
corp would innovate and improve to gain market share when it is so much
cheaper and efficient to displace/buy-out/destroy is preposterous, or
why do you think that semi-socialist Northern European countries have
cheap 100/100 home fiber lines while "free market" US customers usually
have one carrier available that offers 35mbit lines as "high-speed"
highly overpriced and without competition in their respective local
markets? To believe that somehow UPS will build proper roads to your
suburban home so they can deliver packages there is just so naive, but a
core libertarian belief. Someone wanting to do business will do it
somehow...
There are things to be said for libertarianism, I
still like some of it's core ideas. The problem is, as always, human
nature. Libertarians solely rely on punishment after the fact, but if a
corporation kills me with poisoned food that won't do me much good now
will it? I don't want to be one of the hundreds of people dying in a
faulty car that are needed for market forces to kick in so people stop
buying the bad car. I dun give a shit if my death will eventually
make people choose another car.
To circle back to Ayn Rand, here
is yet another reason why libertarians religiously following her
writings should scratch their heads. Libertarians commonly stipulate
that taking care of the disadvantaged/ill/incapable should be done
through charity and not by the state. However, charity is an expression
of altruism, without altruism, there can be no charity. So please do
tell libertarian Ayn Rand followers, if the state does not take care of
the fallen and weak ones, but Randian thought says that altruism is bad,
then who will take care of those that didn't make it? What are we going
to do with them?
In lessaiz-faire capitalism, all that is
self-interest is allowed. One common big-corp practice in the US is to
have people work for your company for decades by promising pensions,
etc., but when the pension liabilities become high corporations simply
restructure their debt, and pensioners are fucked out of what they
thought was their nest egg. Detestable practice, but it happens on a
daily basis in the US. According to Randian thought these fucked-over
individuals are "the weak", not deserving of love, and not entitled to
altruistic measures to lighten their burden.
I guess my question
is, what are you going to do with all those that don't become industrial
magnates? Because according to her, those are the only ones deserving
of any consideration at all. Are we going eskimo and start to send those
that have expired useful shelf-lives off on an ice shoal? This is the
great question that no libertarian has answered to this point. All you
get is vague and ambiguous insinuations that the invisible hand will
take care of that somehow, which is yet another "Randian Paradox",
because by her own philosophy and writings one should not rely on the
metaphysical but on reason. Somehow the market will solve that somewhen
is an epitome of the metaphysical.
-
Johnwholesome, have a +1 for insight and clarity.
-
The
majority of prisoners are very guilty, and guilty of some horrific
crimes, including murder and rape, sometimes multiples of each.
You're
arguing we should have no healthcare provision, no firemen, no prisons,
etc., on the grounds some of the money is also used to start wars?
Interesting. But that is not the Jedi way.
The very guilty should stay behind bars.
I'm
arguing for the idea that government should not use aggression to force
you to do something that you don't want to. Or the idea that an
individual shouldn't be extracted to pay for something they don't want.
The source of aggression and destructiveness lies in our culture, not in
the individual, and the state propagates that agression. And everything
that reinforces the fragmentation of our personality and closes off
access to our inner world contributes to the creation and growth of our
destructive drives. And again, the state reinforces this aggressive
nature through taxation, incarceration, the constant yearning for war,
the whole thing is stone cold evil. There has got to be a better way.
-
By
common good do you mean funding wars to the tune of billions of dollars
a year, including the war on drugs in the US, the maintenance of
prisons where a huge chunk of the population are innocent...
The
majority of prisoners are very guilty, and guilty of some horrific
crimes, including murder and rape, sometimes multiples of each.
You're
arguing we should have no healthcare provision, no firemen, no prisons,
etc., on the grounds some of the money is also used to start wars?
Interesting. But that is not the Jedi way.
Taxation
is Coercion. If you do not pay your taxes, you are kidnapped at
gunpoint, and you are throw in jail, where if you try to escape, you are
shot. I don't know how you are able to be honest with yourself and try
to justify that.
I'll re-justify it to you... each and every time I see my partner and she's not in a wheelchair.
You
literally have 0 idea how a free-market system works. Also, I think
something like 47% of prison inmates (I tried to look up the statistic
but they varied from 40-70%) are NONVIOLENT offenders.
-
You literally have 0 idea how a free-market system works.
You're right, I have no idea how, in a free market, she would not be cripplingly disabled.
So please write a short essay "Multiple Sclerosis in the Free Market".
Bear in mind that, like Tyrion Lannister, I'm not as intelligent as you so please use small words.
-
You literally have 0 idea how a free-market system works.
You're right, I have no idea how, in a free market, she would not be cripplingly disabled.
So please write a short essay "Multiple Sclerosis in the Free Market".
Bear in mind that, like Tyrion Lannister, I'm not as intelligent as you so please use small words.
I
believe that very soon healthcare will become mandatory under Obama's
administration, if I understand it correctly. So there will be a gun
involved in the provision of healthcare. Another instance where state
will use a gun to achieve it's purpose. You or your partner won't have a
say in the matter either way.
-
I
believe that very soon healthcare will become mandatory under Obama's
administration, if I understand it correctly. So there will be a gun
involved in the provision of healthcare. Another instance where state
will use a gun to achieve it's purpose. You or your partner won't have a
say in the matter either way.
I
don't live under Obama's jurisdiction, hence the use of UK alias and
the use of mainly UK Vendors. Living with the "gun to my head", i.e.
taxation for healthcare, is the very reason she is not currently
severely disabled.
Americans can be weird about healthcare. Saw
an interview with an African American. Diabetes had taken his toes.
Nevertheless he didn't want universal healthcare because it was a step
towards Communism. You just gotta LAUGH.
-
I
believe that very soon healthcare will become mandatory under Obama's
administration, if I understand it correctly. So there will be a gun
involved in the provision of healthcare. Another instance where state
will use a gun to achieve it's purpose. You or your partner won't have a
say in the matter either way.
I
don't live under Obama's jurisdiction, hence the use of UK alias and
the use of mainly UK Vendors. Living with the "gun to my head", i.e.
taxation for healthcare, is the very reason she is not currently
severely disabled.
Americans can be weird about healthcare. Saw
an interview with an African American. Diabetes had taken his toes.
Nevertheless he didn't want universal healthcare because it was a step
towards Communism. You just gotta LAUGH.
I've
herad that David Cameron put regulations in place to sell off the NHS
to private companies. Sounds like many poor people with severe
disabilities will be dead. Different government, same BS
-
By
common good do you mean funding wars to the tune of billions of dollars
a year, including the war on drugs in the US, the maintenance of
prisons where a huge chunk of the population are innocent...
The
majority of prisoners are very guilty, and guilty of some horrific
crimes, including murder and rape, sometimes multiples of each.
You're
arguing we should have no healthcare provision, no firemen, no prisons,
etc., on the grounds some of the money is also used to start wars?
Interesting. But that is not the Jedi way.
Taxation
is Coercion. If you do not pay your taxes, you are kidnapped at
gunpoint, and you are throw in jail, where if you try to escape, you are
shot. I don't know how you are able to be honest with yourself and try
to justify that.
I'll re-justify it to you... each and every time I see my partner and she's not in a wheelchair.
You
literally have 0 idea how a free-market system works. Also, I think
something like 47% of prison inmates (I tried to look up the statistic
but they varied from 40-70%) are NONVIOLENT offenders.
I
take that to mean that you favor civil services being delivered by
free-market enterprise. Riddle me this then. The US has the highest
per-capita incarceration rate in the world. Higher than those of the
last remaining communist nations China and Cuba.
As it just so
happens, historically, the rise in incarceration coincided with the rise
of the privately owned prison-industrial-complex. Wall St. just
looooooooves incarcerating non-violent offenders and drug users because
there is really big money in it, look up some of the most notorious
players on a stock ticker, your eyes will pop. You thought prostitution
is recession-proof? Try incarceration!
Those that think the war
on drugs was an oppressive government project should rethink their
stance and do some real digging into how most of the draconian drug laws
came into being. One of the foulest and vile players in that field is
ALEC - a.k.a the American Legislative Exchange Council, a darling think
tank of many a conservative and libertarian. They have systematically
bought up conservative and libertarian candidates brute-forcing
draconian incarceration policies into state after state. Of course most
libertarians will attribute the US's high incarceration rate to
oppressive government, when in fact free-market privateers are the
driving force behind it.
Mind you, I am not defending the
government as such, most current govs are broken and corrupted beyond
belief. But again, their "brokenness" is the result of free-market
self-interest, not a stymieing force working against it.
Let me
formulate it another way, drawing another parallel here. Most
libertarians are ardent defenders of the right to bear arms (lets not
derail into that debate though), their line of argument usually is that
guns don't do bad deeds, the people with the gun do the bad deed. If you
subscribe to that logic, however, then I could stipulate that the same
applies to government. Government is merely the instrument, just like
the gun. It is in the way that this instrument is used that defines
whether the outcome is good or bad.
Now lets compare. The US has
by and large the biggest privately owned prison-industrial complex, and,
it has the highest per capita incarceration rate in the world. Most
other Western, democratic first world countries that have no to limited
privatization have much lower incarceration (and incidentally also
recidivism) rates.
This begs the question if privatization paired
with Randian self-interest propagation is the culprit here. After all,
this modus operandi of big corporations using their political influence
to lobby draconian incarceration policies into law to feed the complex
is merely an expression of "free trade" entities looking out for their
own interest. This is what happens if you incorporate an attitude of
"free trade profit motive" being the pinnacle of noble motivations.
Sound about right?
-
I've
herad that David Cameron put regulations in place to sell off the NHS
to private companies. Sounds like many poor people with severe
disabilities will be dead. Different government, same BS
Not
quite. Anyway, that's the NHS of England and England alone. The Welsh
and Scottish Health Services are separate and distinct... and much
better. And not under his control.
An priceless example of
national vs private enterprise is the water system. In England the water
companies were sold off, from being state-run to private companies. The
promise was lower bills. They've driven them into the ground, leakage
is up, and the prices have risen dramatically and profits have been
exported to Capital. In Scotland it's state-organised. The result is
investment into the infrastructure, reducing leakage, and much lower
prices.
Ann Rand can tongue my balls.
-
I've
herad that David Cameron put regulations in place to sell off the NHS
to private companies. Sounds like many poor people with severe
disabilities will be dead. Different government, same BS
Not
quite. Anyway, that's the NHS of England and England alone. The Welsh
and Scottish Health Services are separate and distinct... and much
better. And not under his control.
An priceless example of
national vs private enterprise is the water system. In England the water
companies were sold off, from being state-run to private companies. The
promise was lower bills. They've driven them into the ground, leakage
is up, and the prices have risen dramatically and profits have been
exported to Capital. In Scotland it's state-organised. The result is
investment into the infrastructure, reducing leakage, and much lower
prices.
Ann Rand can tongue my balls.
Libertarians
don't argue that all private companies are better than public ones,
they argue that they would be if there was a lassiez-faire true market.
-
"during the time men live without a common power to keep them all in
awe, they are in that condition which is called war; and such a war as
is of every man against every man" - Hobbes, Leviathan.
-
Hobbes was the first neocon! He beat out Dick Cheney and company by nearly 400 years. Amazing ;D
Anyway, great going! I like the quote. Here are some other good random ones:
-"We need laws to make men good; without laws, all men would live like apes and society would descend into chaos."
-"The legalization of marijuana and other dangerous drugs will spell the end of civil society."
-"Equality of the races will mean the end of America."
-"Allowing women to have the right to vote will destroy politics forever."
-"Without
the government to keep us safe, we would all soon become victims of
terrorism/communism/separatism/insert_danger_here."
-"Without the Federal Reserve's watchful eye over the economy, all the markets would become disorderly and crash."
-"The
supranational sovereignty of an intellectual elite and world bankers is
surely preferable to the national auto-determination practiced in past
centuries."
I don't have sources for first 6. I just wrote them
out off the top of my head. The last one is from everybody's favorite
billionaire, David Rockefeller ;)
"during
the time men live without a common power to keep them all in awe, they
are in that condition which is called war; and such a war as is of every
man against every man" - Hobbes, Leviathan.
-
The
majority of prisoners are very guilty, and guilty of some horrific
crimes, including murder and rape, sometimes multiples of each.
Not in America they ain't. These links (clearnet) will set ya straight:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incarceration_in_the_United_States
Incarceration in the United States
http://www.policymic.com/articles/20186/war-on-drugs-how-private-prisons-are-using-the-drug-war-to-generate-more-inmates
War on Drugs: How Private Prisons are Using the Drug War to Generate More Inmates
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corrections_Corporation_of_America
Corrections Corporation of America (the largest private corrections company in the United States)
I
take that to mean that you favor civil services being delivered by
free-market enterprise. Riddle me this then. The US has the highest
per-capita incarceration rate in the world. Higher than those of the
last remaining communist nations China and Cuba.
As it just so
happens, historically, the rise in incarceration coincided with the rise
of the privately owned prison-industrial-complex. Wall St. just
looooooooves incarcerating non-violent offenders and drug users because
there is really big money in it, look up some of the most notorious
players on a stock ticker, your eyes will pop. You thought prostitution
is recession-proof? Try incarceration!
Wrong.
The dramatic rise in incarceration in America is a direct and very
obvious symptom of the War on Drugs. That's it. Private prisons sprung
up because they're looting the taxpayer by holding hands with the
fascist government. Every war has its crony capitalist parasites. After
the Rockefeller drug laws were passed in 1973 in NY just after Nixon
declared his drug war the Feds adopted the same policies on a national
scale. Can you say "cha-ching"? 8)
Of
course most libertarians will attribute the US's high incarceration
rate to oppressive government, when in fact free-market privateers are
the driving force behind it.
I'll
let you in on a little secret: just because you SAY you're something
doesn't mean that you are. Anyone can claim to be a libertarian, the
Pope or Elvis. Case in point from ALEC's Wikipedia page:
"Corrections
Corporation of America and The GEO Group, two of the largest for-profit
prison companies in the US, have been contributors to the American
Legislative Exchange Council."
In other words they're a perfect
example of a fascist-created, fascist-run and fascist-catered lobbyist
group. About as far away from libertarian as you can get. They love
government. LOVE IT. The bigger the better!
Government
is merely the instrument, just like the gun. It is in the way that this
instrument is used that defines whether the outcome is good or bad.
Seriously?? Can a gun get up and walk around on its own and shoot people in the name of the "public good"?
Now
lets compare. The US has by and large the biggest privately owned
prison-industrial complex, and, it has the highest per capita
incarceration rate in the world. Most other Western, democratic first
world countries that have no to limited privatization have much lower
incarceration (and incidentally also recidivism) rates.
Again,
you're mixing up capitalism and fascism. As the size of government
grows fascism grows along with it. That means certain large corporations
become a lot larger at the expense of everyone else. Politicians play
favorites because they know that's their meal ticket. These companies
loot everyone else just because they can. Powerful government is their
vessel. They lobby for more and more laws and larger and larger
government. The fascist system exists just to do that.
This begs the question if privatization paired with Randian self-interest propagation is the culprit here.
Everyone
has self interest. EVERYONE. To deny that is to deny the sky is blue.
What Ayn Rand clearly said is that the self interest of the individual
is above all else. When self interest is mixed with powerful government
the self interested get special protection at the expense of their
competitors. The free market dies. The remaining companies and their
political thug counterparts become "moochers" and "looters" as Rand
called them. All of this is spelled out in the Money Speech I linked
earlier here.
The scumbags that you've described in your post ARE
THE VERY EPITOME OF WHAT RAND DESPISED AND RAILED AGAINST. Men "who
produce nothing", "who deal, not in goods, but in favors" and "get
richer by graft and by pull than by work". Here's the best current
example:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2402354/Peace-envoy-Tony-Blair-yacht-Mediterranean-West-debates-air-strikes-Syria.html
Peace envoy Tony Blair on yacht in Mediterranean as West debates air strikes on Syria
;D :o (I really wish there was a smiley face with barf coming out of it)
-
As I have said before in these forums, a major difficulty I see with libertarianism is 'how do we get there from here?'
Clearly most libertarians would agree that
our current system consists of a terrible distortion of the free market,
and thus the wealthy under this system are not the most deserving or
hard working, but those who have played our corrupt system most
successfully.
So,
Libertarian year zero. The state is abolished (or shrunk to a rump legal
system to enforce contracts and perhaps keep the peace). But let's say
you have 1000000 bitcoin and I have 10. You also have 100000 acres of
land which fortunately contains an oil well and a supply of fresh water
and a port. (you were cunning enough to acquire these advantages by
bribing politicians etc under our present fascist system) Alas, I am a
landless peasant. Let's play a few generations of 'free market'
Hmmmm. My descendants still appear to
be working for your descendants. They seeming to be working really hard
but are struggling to pay the rent on the house you rent them. After
they pay the fuel and water and food bills (all to you or your class)
every month they have nothing left.....meanwhile your descendants get
more and more wealthy. I guess they must be a naturally superior kind of
people?
It seems
then that to begin a Libertarian society some kind of redistribution of
illegitimately acquired wealth might be in order. But how to achieve
this without violating the first libertarian commandment 'do no harm'?
We cannot seize wealth by violence as that will make our claim equally
illegitimate.
Another difficulty I have with libertarianism is the characterisation of
most of those in class 1 or 2 as lazy, parasitic useless mouths. No
doubt some are, but many of the unemployed are both capable and willing
to work, its just that the tidal fluctuations of the market have left
them high and dry. "Ah hah!" crys the libertarian "but this is because
of government interference; under a truly free market, the surplus
labour will cause wages to drop until we have nearly full employment"
But, high unemployment in Europe and US is a result of factories etc
moving to poorer countrys where wages are lower. I have heard
libertarians argue that under a free market, wages and living conditions
will rise in these countrys. This makes sense, if we had a free market
you would expect conditions to equalise.
However, it seems likely that the market
might prefer higher unemployment than society finds desirable. High
unemployment keeps wages low and so might be more profitable than full
employment, despite 10% of people lying idle. The market has no
mechanism to correct this. (you can contradict me here, but this is a
well understood and widely accepted criticism of lassiez faire)
Once wages have
equalised worldwide we might run into another problem: increased
automation. Already most manufacturing is done by robots. The humans are
basically employed to load/unload the robots. If in the future robots
become cheaper and cheaper (as seems likely) then less and less humans
will be needed. We would then see the paradox of technology producing
great abundance, and yet much of the population being unemployed. Would
anyone argue that the unemployed in this situation are lazy parasites?
The contrasting
assumption is that those in classes 3 and 4 are the virtuous engines of
society. Particularly that those in class 4, driven to enrich themselves
at all costs, are mostly engaged in useful and productive work. This is
certainly the case for many of the entrepreneurs and businessmen. But
what about the large number who are engaged in buying and selling
derivatives? What useful function does this wholesale gambling serve,
other to enrich the participants? Since the market for these financial
instruments exceeds the 'real' economy by several orders of magnitude
this is an important question.
Finally, I want to discuss that classic libertarian
trope: that taxation is theft. if you do not pay your taxes, men with
guns will come and put you in prison. Why should the government decide
what I spend my money on? if I wanted to give to charity etc etc. Often
the words 'mafia' and 'protection racket' feature.
Well guys, got some bad
news for you: at whatever point in history you lived, men with weapons
ruled over you. They took a certain fraction of your produce, and in
return they promised to protect you with their weapons. When america was
colonised, the first thing the colonists did was evict the previous
occupants with their superior weapons. They pretty quickly established a
new government backed by men with guns (I admit I am compressing
history somewhat here!)
Libertarians basically say "Fuck this! If I
want men with weapons, I will HIRE MY OWN!" The trouble with hiring men
with guns, though, as many small time dictators discovered too
late, is: they have guns. As Kipling put it "when you have once paid the
Danegeld, you can never get rid of the Dane"
If we were to get rid of the
current government, I predict that before long you would be paying
'taxes' to a genuine mafia. At least under the current system the
protection money is used to provide care for the elderly and poor and
sick. I really have no problem with money being taken by force
from the wealthy and used to deal with some of the problems caused by
their activities.
Of course, a lot of the tax money is spent on things like
putting drug users in prison and waging wars on oil producing countrys. I
agree that these should cease, but this is not a problem with taxation.
Its a problem with the current government. It does not make taxation
itself illegitimate.( And, by golly, we do like oil. In a libertarian
society perhaps the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan would have been
carried out by BP and Shell directly, rather then their government sock
puppets.)
Put simply, my main problem with libertarianism is that it
idolises the market above all else. The market is a fantastic mechanism
for determining prices but its decisions are not it binding. We should
be free to interfere with it wherever we see fit, the market is robust
enough to adjust to whatever we do. So things like banning child labour,
providing welfare to unemployed, and regulating employment conditions
are all fine, despite being anathema to libertarians.
In particular, the
libertarian stance on child labour demonstrates their extremist
philosophy perfectly. In this forum I have seen libertarians argue, in
all seriousness, that laws restricting very young children from working
are wrong, as they interfere with that child's rights. "If a child wants
to work, because his family need the money, who are we to stop
him"
I leave that for your consideration
-
Just a clarification on the fly here. There was talk of the
"fascist" government (presumably US) and this always makes me cringe.
The US government is anything but fascist.
Granted cops in SWAT
gear breaking down grandma's front door ransacking the house because
little Billy bought a gram of weed earlier in the day obviously is quite
reminiscent of the brownshirts kicking in doors to look for Jews, but
that doesn't mean that the government system is fascist.
The
three defining characteristics of fascism are ultranationalism (check),
militarism (check) and control of the regime over national resources and
production while retaining private property.
And therein lies
the crux. In the US, government doesn't control big business, big
business owns government. Also, the nationalism aspect is also weak at
best, for underneath all the red white and blue redderick and national
pride pomp the leaders of the US ever so happily stand by as big
multinational corporations sell the country out to China, export jobs to
wherever labor is cheap and watch the national currency deteriorate.
Now,
granted, there are many aspects that are reminiscent of fascist regimes
throughout history, but by definition, the US can't be fascist because
it lacks certain key characteristics of fascism. I'm not saying that the
system is any better than fascism, just wanted to point it out as I am a
stickler for proper labels :P
-
Did you know a WW1 veteran Smedley D Butler was asked by DuPont to organise a fascist coup? He refused, of course.
Worth reading up on.
-
I
believe that very soon healthcare will become mandatory under Obama's
administration, if I understand it correctly. So there will be a gun
involved in the provision of healthcare. Another instance where state
will use a gun to achieve it's purpose. You or your partner won't have a
say in the matter either way.
I
don't live under Obama's jurisdiction, hence the use of UK alias and
the use of mainly UK Vendors. Living with the "gun to my head", i.e.
taxation for healthcare, is the very reason she is not currently
severely disabled.
Americans can be weird about healthcare. Saw
an interview with an African American. Diabetes had taken his toes.
Nevertheless he didn't want universal healthcare because it was a step
towards Communism. You just gotta LAUGH.
Once
I saw an interview with two African Americans. Kidney failure was about
to take both of their lives. Nevertheless, they did not want some
random person to be killed so they could harvest two working kidneys.
You just gotta LAUGH.
-
As
it just so happens, historically, the rise in incarceration coincided
with the rise of the privately owned prison-industrial-complex. Wall St.
just looooooooves incarcerating non-violent offenders and drug users
because there is really big money in it, look up some of the most
notorious players on a stock ticker, your eyes will pop. You thought
prostitution is recession-proof? Try incarceration!
Those that
think the war on drugs was an oppressive government project should
rethink their stance and do some real digging into how most of the
draconian drug laws came into being. One of the foulest and vile players
in that field is ALEC - a.k.a the American Legislative Exchange
Council, a darling think tank of many a conservative and libertarian.
They have systematically bought up conservative and libertarian
candidates brute-forcing draconian incarceration policies into state
after state. Of course most libertarians will attribute the US's high
incarceration rate to oppressive government, when in fact free-market
privateers are the driving force behind it.
Buuuuuuuuuulshit.
If libertarians were in charge of the USA the prison population would
plummet. Not only would all drug offenders be released from prison, but
so would the people busted with CP and probably a lot of people locked
up for statutory rape. Probably a lot of people locked up for tax
evasion would be released as well if hard line libertarians took control
of the country. Hell a ton of the people in prison in USA today did no
wrong in the eyes of libertarians.
-
I
believe that very soon healthcare will become mandatory under Obama's
administration, if I understand it correctly. So there will be a gun
involved in the provision of healthcare. Another instance where state
will use a gun to achieve it's purpose. You or your partner won't have a
say in the matter either way.
I
don't live under Obama's jurisdiction, hence the use of UK alias and
the use of mainly UK Vendors. Living with the "gun to my head", i.e.
taxation for healthcare, is the very reason she is not currently
severely disabled.
Americans can be weird about healthcare. Saw
an interview with an African American. Diabetes had taken his toes.
Nevertheless he didn't want universal healthcare because it was a step
towards Communism. You just gotta LAUGH.
Once
I saw an interview with two African Americans. Kidney failure was about
to take both of their lives. Nevertheless, they did not want some
random person to be killed so they could harvest two working kidneys.
You just gotta LAUGH.
Although
we have universal healthcare in the UK, we very rarely kill random
people to harvest their organs. You are an enigma kmfkewn, sometimes you
come back with devastating logic that is difficult to argue with,
other times you come out with odd non sequiturs like this.
As far as incarceration goes I am unsure how the
legal system will function under libertarianism. Will the police, courts
and prisons still be state controlled and funded through taxation? Who
will make the laws....shit, I have just realised I sound like this song:
Crass
If There Was No Government
If there was no government, wouldn't there be chaos
Everybody running round, setting petrol bombs off?
And if there was no police force, tell me what you'd do
If thirty thousand rioters came running after you?
And who would clean the sewers? Who'd mend my television?
Wouldn't people lay about without some supervision?
Who'd drive the fire engines? Who'd fix my video?
If there were no prisons, well, where would robbers go?
And what if I told you to Fuck Off?
What if there's no army to stop a big invasion?
Who'd clean the bogs and sweep the floors? We'd have all immigration.
Who'd pull the pint at the local pub? Where'd I get my fags?
Who'd empty out my dustbins? Would I still get plastic bags?
If there were no hospitals, and no doctors too,
If I'd broken both my legs, where would I run to?
If there's no medication, if there were no nurses,
Wouldn't people die a lot? And who would drive the hearses?
And what if I told you to Fuck Off?
If there were no butchers shops, what would people eat?
You'd have everybody starving if they didn't get their meat.
If there was no water, what would people drink?
Who'd flush away the you-know-what? But of course MINE never stink.
What about the children? Who'd teach them in the schools?
Who'd make the beggers keep in line? Learn them all the rules?
Who's tell us whitewash windows? When to take down doors?
Tell us make a flask of tea and survive the holocaust?
-
As a sidebar (not sure how it fits in to either side of argument) I
recommend a book 'the new Jim Crow' and a film 'the house I
live in' both about the prison system in america. Both portray the
prison industry as largely economic in motivation. With the collapse of
heavy industry in the US due to cheaper labour costs elsewhere, many
cities are left with a huge surplus of mostly black workers. In most
inner cities the vacuum has been filled by the drug business. The
inhabitants of these areas are not criminals, they are simply
taking the only form of gainful employment available.
At the same time the huge prison complexes are major
employers that bring great economic benefit to the area. So its a win
win; by passing punitive laws against drugs the troublesome surplus
black workers can be rounded up and imprisoned, at the same time
providing jobs for other impoverished communities.
The logical next step would be to use the imprisoned
workers as slave labour to produce goods for sale and indeed this is
already beginning.
I'm not sure how these
things fit into the argument about libertarianism, as I am unclear how
laws will be enforced or even made without a central government funded
by taxation. I suspect many libertarians are also unclear on this.
I mean, clearly the legal system could be
made self funding by levying large fines, seizing assets and forcing
prisoners to work, but introducing the profit motive in this way could
have negative consequences on the impartiality of judiciary!
-
Once
I saw an interview with two African Americans. Kidney failure was about
to take both of their lives. Nevertheless, they did not want some
random person to be killed so they could harvest two working kidneys.
You just gotta LAUGH.
Exactly the same except (a) my story happened and (b) my story didn't require harm to a third party for his medical treatment?
-
Once
I saw an interview with two African Americans. Kidney failure was about
to take both of their lives. Nevertheless, they did not want some
random person to be killed so they could harvest two working kidneys.
You just gotta LAUGH.
Exactly the same except (a) my story happened and (b) my story didn't require harm to a third party for his medical treatment?
You
think sending armed thugs with guns to rob people doesn't cause harm to
the robbed person? Where do you think the money for socialized health
care comes from? It comes from tax dollars. Tax dollars that are
collected by the IRS. If you don't pay taxes they will come and
arrest you. If you resist arrest they will point guns at you. Socialized
health care is funded by armed robberies.
-
Once
I saw an interview with two African Americans. Kidney failure was about
to take both of their lives. Nevertheless, they did not want some
random person to be killed so they could harvest two working kidneys.
You just gotta LAUGH.
Exactly the same except (a) my story happened and (b) my story didn't require harm to a third party for his medical treatment?
You
think sending armed thugs with guns to rob people doesn't cause harm to
the robbed person? Where do you think the money for socialized health
care comes from? It comes from tax dollars. Tax dollars that are
collected by the IRS. If you don't pay taxes they will come and
arrest you. If you resist arrest they will point guns at you. Socialized
health care is funded by armed robberies.
People
that do not get health insurance get sick. THEY go to the ERs of county
hospitals for colds and flu and ear infections thus driving up MY
health care costs. The "choice" to be uninsured is funded by depriving
me and anyone else. How is that any better?
Some people are so maladjusted and antisocial that they only stop harming others at gunpoint. What's the news?
-
Once
I saw an interview with two African Americans. Kidney failure was about
to take both of their lives. Nevertheless, they did not want some
random person to be killed so they could harvest two working kidneys.
You just gotta LAUGH.
Exactly the same except (a) my story happened and (b) my story didn't require harm to a third party for his medical treatment?
You
think sending armed thugs with guns to rob people doesn't cause harm to
the robbed person? Where do you think the money for socialized health
care comes from? It comes from tax dollars. Tax dollars that are
collected by the IRS. If you don't pay taxes they will come and
arrest you. If you resist arrest they will point guns at you. Socialized
health care is funded by armed robberies.
People
that do not get health insurance get sick. THEY go to the ERs of county
hospitals for colds and flu and ear infections thus driving up MY
health care costs. The "choice" to be uninsured is funded by depriving
me and anyone else. How is that any better?
Some people are so maladjusted and antisocial that they only stop harming others at gunpoint. What's the news?
How
are you deprived by someone else being uninsured? Do you own the
hospital? The hospital can decide who they treat and who they do not
treat, it is their right. If they don't want to treat people who cannot
afford it, then that is up to them as well. Nobody is depriving you of
shit, you want to deprive others of the right to not be insured and
apparently you want to deprive the hospital of the right to treat
whoever they want. You are the one who wants to use guns pointed at
others to solve all of your problems, regardless of if you want to point
the gun at a person without insurance or at the doctor who decides to
treat people without insurance. You are the one who wants to use guns
for your own benefit.
-
Once
I saw an interview with two African Americans. Kidney failure was about
to take both of their lives. Nevertheless, they did not want some
random person to be killed so they could harvest two working kidneys.
You just gotta LAUGH.
Exactly the same except (a) my story happened and (b) my story didn't require harm to a third party for his medical treatment?
You
think sending armed thugs with guns to rob people doesn't cause harm to
the robbed person? Where do you think the money for socialized health
care comes from? It comes from tax dollars. Tax dollars that are
collected by the IRS. If you don't pay taxes they will come and
arrest you. If you resist arrest they will point guns at you. Socialized
health care is funded by armed robberies.
People
that do not get health insurance get sick. THEY go to the ERs of county
hospitals for colds and flu and ear infections thus driving up MY
health care costs. The "choice" to be uninsured is funded by depriving
me and anyone else. How is that any better?
Some people are so maladjusted and antisocial that they only stop harming others at gunpoint. What's the news?
How
are you deprived by someone else being uninsured? Do you own the
hospital? The hospital can decide who they treat and who they do not
treat, it is their right. If they don't want to treat people who cannot
afford it, then that is up to them as well. Nobody is depriving you of
shit, you want to deprive others of the right to not be insured and
apparently you want to deprive the hospital of the right to treat
whoever they want. You are the one who wants to use guns pointed at
others to solve all of your problems, regardless of if you want to point
the gun at a person without insurance or at the doctor who decides to
treat people without insurance. You are the one who wants to use guns
for your own benefit.
Utter bullshit,
hospitals
are required to provide emergency care under the Medical Treatment and
Active Labor Act passed in 1986. That act became necessary because in
the world you fantasize about "admissions officers" would ask bleeding
people for an insurance/credit card and send them off to die on the
corner if they had neither. Some utopia... you can keep that.
No
matter what your stance on this is, whether it is morally okay to let
people die or not, whether you favor socialistic or libertarian
approaches, no libertarian ever answers the question, what do you do
with the uninsured if they have an emergency? Do you just let them die
on the road? How long do you think it will take until the mob starts
rioting in the street if you have uncle Bobs and granny Maples dieing in
the streets everywhere? All libertarians offer is some metaphysical
insinuation that somehow this will sort itself out if only regulation is
removed. Might as well try praying...
-
Put simply, most modern societies are a symbiosis between the State
and the Market. Both are necessary for a functional society.
Communism is the belief that we can do without the
market, the state will provide and decide everything.
Libertarianism is the idea that we can do without the
state, the market will provide and decide everything.
Both are flawed, utopian philosophys that could not be made to work in the real world.
I think the problems with communism as it was
tried in USSR are so well known as to need little discussion here.
My main objection to libertarianism us that
it refuses to acknowledge the inequities of capitalism. In the
libertarian world view, the poor are poor because they are lazy and
unimaginative. The rich are rich due to their hard work and superior
merit. I think this is why it is so popular in the US, where the myth
that anyone can make it rich if only they try hard enough is engrained
in the culture. In fact social mobility in the US is very restrictive.
The children of rich parents get all the advantages of good education,
good health care, good diet and access to finance, and thus have much
greater opportunity than similar poor children.
It is a fact that most poor people work extremely hard
merely to maintain their position. They are paid sufficient to feed and
house themselves in most cases but lacking capital their only option is
to sell their labour to employers. The employers, possessing capital use
it to purchase raw materials, machinery and labour, and sell the goods
thus produced for a profit, enabling them to live well for much less
work. This is then characterised as 'providing work' for the poor and is
regarded as great generosity.
-
The whole 'men with guns' argument is tired, and relies on a very tendential, emotive characterisation of taxation.
Nearly everyone, even libertarians, agree that use
of force is justifiable in certain circumstances. For instance, a man
has a knife to someone's throat, most people would accept the use of
force to prevent murder.
But what if one
person has plenty of food, and another is starving to death. Is it
acceptable to use force to redistribute the food? I would say yes, but
most libertarians would say no I think?
These
two situations are not the same, but they do both exist on a line
running from 'acceptable use of force' to 'unacceptable force'.
Further along the same line is:
One man has a nice iPhone, another does not. Clearly no
one would argue it is acceptable for the phone less man to seize it by
force.
So, its not black and white.
Redistributive taxation falls somewhere along the line. It depends on
your beliefs whether you place it closer to one end it the other. But to
characterize it as 'men with guns coming to takje your money by force'
is a distortion.
Libertarians often talk
as if they would prefer a voluntary system. So instead of playing taxes
for police, fire service, roads etc. they would choose to pay into the
system of their choosing for these services.
What they overlook is that the current system of taxation IS
voluntary. If you don't like it you can take your business elsewhere, to
a country where the taxation system is more to your liking. By choosing
to live in a country you are accepting its laws....
-
Libertarians often talk as if they would prefer a
voluntary system. So instead of playing taxes for police, fire service,
roads etc. they would choose to pay into the system of their choosing
for these services.
What they overlook is
that the current system of taxation IS voluntary. If you don't like it
you can take your business elsewhere, to a country where the taxation
system is more to your liking. By choosing to live in a country you are
accepting its laws....
I am ashamed of this argument.
-
Libertarians often talk as if they would prefer a
voluntary system. So instead of playing taxes for police, fire service,
roads etc. they would choose to pay into the system of their choosing
for these services.
What they overlook is
that the current system of taxation IS voluntary. If you don't like it
you can take your business elsewhere, to a country where the taxation
system is more to your liking. By choosing to live in a country you are
accepting its laws....
I am ashamed of this argument.
You
shouldn't be, for it is right. Most libertarians hold the belief that
just being born means some sort of inherent set of "rights" is bestowed
upon them. I think that humans are just another species of animals, so
the only right you really have is to be eaten by the next best thing
that is faster, stronger, better suited to eat you. The reason we aren't
being eaten is that we have achieved a certain level of intellectual
and technological superiority over claws and fangs. When you are born
you benefit from this, hence you are "indebted" to your herd for it has
made that possible. You can't just reach adulthood by the grace of these
benefits and then say oh hai, I dun like that, I choose not to
contribute to it.
-
Libertarians often talk as if they would prefer a
voluntary system. So instead of playing taxes for police, fire service,
roads etc. they would choose to pay into the system of their choosing
for these services.
What they overlook is
that the current system of taxation IS voluntary. If you don't like it
you can take your business elsewhere, to a country where the taxation
system is more to your liking. By choosing to live in a country you are
accepting its laws....
I am ashamed of this argument.
You
shouldn't be, for it is right. Most libertarians hold the belief that
just being born means some sort of inherent set of "rights" is bestowed
upon them. I think that humans are just another species of animals, so
the only right you really have is to be eaten by the next best thing
that is faster, stronger, better suited to eat you. The reason we aren't
being eaten is that we have achieved a certain level of intellectual
and technological superiority over claws and fangs. When you are born
you benefit from this, hence you are "indebted" to your herd for it has
made that possible. You can't just reach adulthood by the grace of these
benefits and then say oh hai, I dun like that, I choose not to
contribute to it.
I
think slaves said something similiar to "oh hai, I dun like that, I
choose not to contribute to it." Not everything we've been
provided by our herd is beneficial, in fact a lot of it is detrimental.
That doesn't mean we shouldn't be grateful for the things we have. For
instance we still have nuclear bombs, just in case we want to end the
world i guess? I think it's rather childish, it's like these leaders
have no foresight whatsoever. Does anyone give a fuck about the children
of the future? I guess they'll just leave it for the next generation to
decide. The part about saying i choose not to contribute doesn't make
much sense to me, because i can think of plenty of people who do just
that.
Mental slavery isn't much better than physical slavery, if
anything it's worse. This is the case for a large majority of the
population. They are either too lazy or unintelligent to educate
themselves. If humans continue down the road of endless consumption
there may not be any more species on this planet. If there are it
certainly won't be humans. Personally i like humans, I think some of us
are fucking great. I'm all for keeping our species alive and going into
space. If we don't kill ourselves before we leave the planet then
something from outerspace will. The universe could honestly care less.
Personally
i believe the amount of left over money that is WASTED, on the
countless wars would be more than enough to provide people with quality
educations, better healthcare, food and housing. That doesn't even
factor in the other useless services people unwittingly waste their tax
dollars on. After that we could work on viable solutions for
overpopulation and get serious about space exploration.
I agree
that many libertarians opinions aren't exactly agreeable with reality,
although at least some of them are trying to think. The argument of
"since we didn't come up with anything better, the system we have must
be the best there is" is utter bullshit in my opinion, and isn't much
better. You guys act like being born in a country is fucking optional,
you think the people in north korea agree with you? It isn't exactly
easy to move from one country to another. And even if you did the most
of the same fuckheads with no foresight except monetary growth are still
in charge, making the laws. Deciding the future of humanity for us.
-
The whole 'men with guns' argument is tired, and relies on a very tendential, emotive characterisation of taxation.
Nearly everyone, even libertarians, agree that use
of force is justifiable in certain circumstances. For instance, a man
has a knife to someone's throat, most people would accept the use of
force to prevent murder.
But what if one
person has plenty of food, and another is starving to death. Is it
acceptable to use force to redistribute the food? I would say yes, but
most libertarians would say no I think?
These
two situations are not the same, but they do both exist on a line
running from 'acceptable use of force' to 'unacceptable force'.
Further along the same line is:
One man has a nice iPhone, another does not. Clearly no
one would argue it is acceptable for the phone less man to seize it by
force.
So, its not black and white.
Redistributive taxation falls somewhere along the line. It depends on
your beliefs whether you place it closer to one end it the other. But to
characterize it as 'men with guns coming to takje your money by force'
is a distortion.
Libertarians often talk
as if they would prefer a voluntary system. So instead of playing taxes
for police, fire service, roads etc. they would choose to pay into the
system of their choosing for these services.
What they overlook is that the current system of taxation IS
voluntary. If you don't like it you can take your business elsewhere, to
a country where the taxation system is more to your liking. By choosing
to live in a country you are accepting its laws....
Two
men are born equal, Man A decides to work his ass off for a living,
while Man B decides to do the opposite. It is not ok to come at Man A
with a gun and tell him to pay for man B's food because B is a lazy,
unmotivated human. But that is what is going on right now. I don't
understand why any one would argue for force to be used.
We are all in control of our own destiny, Man B has to suffer with the choices he has made in the past at this very moment.
When
it comes to the mentally/physically disabled, I find it fine to come
after Man A with force, Man A has plenty to eat while talking a very
small amount from his pay would not make his life any worse. While the
disabled man never had a choice.
I do believe that everyone is
born equal, and even if someone is born in the hood (which would rarely
happen with a good economy and an unemployment rate close to 0) they are
still able to go to school, get their scholarship to a good high
school/college. They just have to make their own choices and do what is
best for them. Even though everyone around the person from the hood is
dropping out and pushing them too also, they have to take control of
their own destiny and not let society take control of it for them.
-
I
do believe that everyone is born equal, and even if someone is born in
the hood (which would rarely happen with a good economy and an
unemployment rate close to 0) they are still able to go to school, get
their scholarship to a good high school/college. They just have to make
their own choices and do what is best for them. Even though everyone
around the person from the hood is dropping out and pushing them too
also, they have to take control of their own destiny and not let society
take control of it for them.
Two
things here; I'm not sure that libertarianism will bring unemployment
rate close to zero, or that if it did those in the hood would be lifted
out if poverty. Presumably those now unemployed would be provided with
sub current minimum wage work which they would be forced to accept
by removal of benefits. Is this an improvement?
Secondly, this is once again the pernicious myth that
someone born into poor circumstances has plenty of chances to work hard,
go to college and change their life, and therefore those who fail to do
this are deserving of their fate.
Libertarians talk about freedom a lot but why should a child born
to poor parents have so much less opportunity than one born into wealth?
I am reminded of the phrase "justice in England is like the Ritz hotel:
open to everyone" The whole aim of redistributive taxation is to level
this uneven playing field somewhat.
I
remember seeing an episode of "The Secret Millionaire" (a sick making
maudlin show where some wealthy nouveau riche type goes to a poor
neighbourhood in guise of a fellow pauper, involves himself in some
worthy projects and on the last day whips off his mask and starts
handing out cheques and patronising praise). This particular program
featured a young man from a wealthy suburb of Liverpool whos father had a
large student property portfolio. On his 18th birthday his dad gave him
£1 million, with the understanding he would have to manage with that.
The boy proudly described how by buying student property during the boom
of the early century he had doubled his money to £2million, and paid
his father back. He therefore regarded himself as a self made
millionaire.
After I took my foot out of
the TV, I reflected that this little Lord Fauntleroy would probably look
down on the poor oiks who hadn't made a fortune out of property to lift
themselves out of poverty.... after all he had managed. They must just
be lazy or stupid or both.
The thing is
that a child born to wealthy parents can be lazy or stupid and make
plenty of mistakes but still go to college and be given a well paying
job by daddy's friends. A child born in the hood who dares take his eyes
off the ball briefly will end up stuck in a rut of poverty, working two
jobs to pay the bills, no time to consider education and god help him
if he falls expensively I'll or has legal trouble or is black.
I have no problem with taxation taking money from
the wealthy to attempt to provide the poor with some of the
opportunities for self improvement that they may lack. The better off
aren't going to do this voluntarily. My definition of freedom rates
equality of opportunity more highly than an individuals right to use
their wealth to acquire advantages for their children.
Libertarianism promises freedom for the rich to oppress the
poor. Their is an unpleasant thread of social Darwinism present in its
advocates.....they constantly talk about the poor in such terms as lazy,
unmotivated, parasites. You always get the impression they are
imagining themselves as being healthy, wealthy and successful under a
libertarian system, so why should they pay for the upkeep of an indigent
pauper class?
-
And now another punk song:
The Business. 'Do they owe us a living?'
Fuck the politically minded, here's something I want to say,
About the state of nation, the way it treats us today.
At school they give you shit, drop you in the pit,
You try, you try, you try to get out, but you can't because they've fucked you about.
Then you're a prime example of how they must not be,
This is just a sample of what they've done to you and me.
Do they owe us a living?
Of course they do, of course they do.
Owe us a living?
Of course they do, of course they do.
Owe us a living?
OF COURSE THEY FUCKING DO.
Don't want me anymore, cos I threw it on the floor.
Used to call me sweet thing, I'm nobody's plaything,
And now that I am different, 'd love to bust my head,
You'd love to see me cop-out, 'd love to see me dead.
Do they owe us a living?
Of course they do, of course they do.
Owe us a living?
Of course they do, of course they do.
Owe us a living?
OF COURSE THEY FUCKING DO.
The living that is owed to me I'm never going to get,
They've buggered this old world up, up to their necks in debt.
They'd give you a lobotomy for something you ain't done,
They'll make you an epitomy of everything that's wrong.
Do they owe us a living?
Of course they do, of course they do.
Owe us a living?
Of course they do, of course they do.
Owe us a living?
OF COURSE THEY FUCKING DO.
Don't take any notice of what the public think,
They're so hyped up with T.V., they just don't want to think.
They'll use you as a target for demands and for advice,
When you don't want to hear it they'll say you're full of vice.
Do they owe us a living?
Of course they do, of course they do.
Owe us a living?
Of course they do, of course they do.
Owe us a living?
OF COURSE THEY FUCKING DO.
-
I'm in a simular boat to you, used to strongly champion
libertarianism in all its forms, but after studying sociology my opinion
somewhat shifted. I think libertarianism is the default of what human
social structures will shift towards - we are naturally selfish (or
self-interested) and unchecked we will seek to acquire as much liberty
as possible. That is only a problem when the liberties you take impact
other people - and in this complex world they almost always do.
My
position now centres more around communitarianism - I recognise
individual success relies heavily on others. No individual achievements
would be possible without all of our collective achievements. Humans are
at their greatest when we work together.
You should read John
Stewart Mills, he was very competent in articulating libertarianism. I
agree whole heartedly with his "harm theory" - no law should prohibit
behaviour that does not dirrectly impact another human being.
That's my rant done
-
Libertarians often talk as if they would prefer a
voluntary system. So instead of playing taxes for police, fire service,
roads etc. they would choose to pay into the system of their choosing
for these services.
What they overlook is
that the current system of taxation IS voluntary. If you don't like it
you can take your business elsewhere, to a country where the taxation
system is more to your liking. By choosing to live in a country you are
accepting its laws....
I am ashamed of this argument.
You
shouldn't be, for it is right. Most libertarians hold the belief that
just being born means some sort of inherent set of "rights" is bestowed
upon them. I think that humans are just another species of animals, so
the only right you really have is to be eaten by the next best thing
that is faster, stronger, better suited to eat you. The reason we aren't
being eaten is that we have achieved a certain level of intellectual
and technological superiority over claws and fangs. When you are born
you benefit from this, hence you are "indebted" to your herd for it has
made that possible. You can't just reach adulthood by the grace of these
benefits and then say oh hai, I dun like that, I choose not to
contribute to it.
I
think slaves said something similiar to "oh hai, I dun like that, I
choose not to contribute to it." Not everything we've been
provided by our herd is beneficial, in fact a lot of it is detrimental.
That doesn't mean we shouldn't be grateful for the things we have. For
instance we still have nuclear bombs, just in case we want to end the
world i guess? I think it's rather childish, it's like these leaders
have no foresight whatsoever. Does anyone give a fuck about the children
of the future? I guess they'll just leave it for the next generation to
decide. The part about saying i choose not to contribute doesn't make
much sense to me, because i can think of plenty of people who do just
that.
Mental slavery isn't much better than physical slavery, if
anything it's worse. This is the case for a large majority of the
population. They are either too lazy or unintelligent to educate
themselves. If humans continue down the road of endless consumption
there may not be any more species on this planet. If there are it
certainly won't be humans. Personally i like humans, I think some of us
are fucking great. I'm all for keeping our species alive and going into
space. If we don't kill ourselves before we leave the planet then
something from outerspace will. The universe could honestly care less.
Personally
i believe the amount of left over money that is WASTED, on the
countless wars would be more than enough to provide people with quality
educations, better healthcare, food and housing. That doesn't even
factor in the other useless services people unwittingly waste their tax
dollars on. After that we could work on viable solutions for
overpopulation and get serious about space exploration.
I agree
that many libertarians opinions aren't exactly agreeable with reality,
although at least some of them are trying to think. The argument of
"since we didn't come up with anything better, the system we have must
be the best there is" is utter bullshit in my opinion, and isn't much
better. You guys act like being born in a country is fucking optional,
you think the people in north korea agree with you? It isn't exactly
easy to move from one country to another. And even if you did the most
of the same fuckheads with no foresight except monetary growth are still
in charge, making the laws. Deciding the future of humanity for us.
So
if "the market" tells you fucko, you is shit out of luck, you trained
the wrong skills, you made the wrong investment, you made a/some wrong
decision(s), please confine yourself to a life of mere substandard
subsistence then that is okay, if you are born into a country with
taxation that tells you fucko you want to use lighted roads and get an
ambulance to get you if need be and we make sure big corp doesn't poison
you then that is terrible and tyranny.
I guess what I am trying
to say is I can't for the life of me understand how (radical)
libertarians make that distinction that being tyrannized by
society/government is da worst thing evah whereas being tyrannized by
capital is just great and dandy. To me being tyrannized is always
terrible regardless of the source of said tyranny. And make no mistake,
it has become painfully obvious what big capital will do to you without
blinking once over the last couple decades. In the US, every major bill
deregulating something has resulted in people getting hurt big time by
the $$$-elite.
Here's the thing, and this is my beef with
libertarians, there has never been a truly libertarian society in world
history. Hence, all the assertions that some invisible greater force
will swoop in and make everything right for everyone if only any and all
regulation is removed can be regarded as little more as wishful
thinking. There isn't really any scientific indication that anything
would get better. For all we know things would get worse. To go back to
the US as an example: banking got deregulated, look at what happened in
2007/2008 (number of financial breakdowns in Canada since the nation was
founded: 0), telecommunications got deregulated look what happened.
Most Americans have literally only one carrier available to them, whilst
people in "socialist hell" Europe get to choose between 3 or 4
different carriers offering 50/50 highspeed lines.
And that's
just it, most hardcore libertarians seem almost like religious people to
me, for they don't base their assertions of what would be not on
observation of that which we have already seen, but on something that is
mere belief, just like Jesus (I'm an ardent atheist by the way so that
wasn't a compliment).
Long story short: show me one sports team
that will improve it's performance by removing a formal training
regimen, show me one business organization that will improve it's profit
by removing conduct regulations and requirements from its employees, it
just doesn't make sense.
Does that mean the status quo is
acceptable or even good? No, of course not, most governments in the
world are broken beyond belief, however, the solution to that is fix
government, not get rid of it. The proper solution to slippery slopes is
proper oversight, not inaction.
If the last 300 years have
taught us anything then it is that the proper response is democracy with
sensible oversight and regulation.
As for the poor man/rich man
comparisons above, I don't want to punish or take from an achiever, but I
do want a society where the playing field is level and everyone starts
from the same starting line. Libertarianism will invariably lead to a
situation where the financially privileged will start 50 yards ahead of
everyone on the inside track, that is not freedom, that is not liberty,
it's oppression only that here money is used to oppress instead of state
force.
-
As my subject suggests, I used to be a Libertarian.
Libertarianism
assumes everyone is ready and willing to compete and work hard, and
that everyone has something special to bring to market, if only given
the chance. Ridiculous as well. Here's why.
The world is filled with four kind of people in my estimation:
1) Those whom cannot "do"
2) Those whom can "do" a little but are not very motivated to do so.
3) Those whom can "do" a little and are motivated to do so.
4) Those whom can "do" a lot, and are super motivated.
If you think differntly, then please share where has my reasoning failed me? :-)
With an perception like that, you were never libertarian... you only claim to be.
In your mind... what is "do"?... What is "a lot"... "a little"... "motivated"?
To
you what may seem "a lot", may seem like nothing to another... and/or
vice versa. I may find taking a shit in the morning motivational,
yet others not so much. So how do you define these perceptions
then?
Sounds to me like you just want a big mud slinging socialist circle jerk...
-
Sorry,
but aside from the illegality of selling drugs, what exactly are these
'huge barriers to entry' for starting a new business that you believe
aren't currently possible under the current western system?
(+1 for you, Reason. A nicely reasoned, non-dogmatic dialogue starter!)
If
you operate a Bitcoin exchange you need to know my customers. Running a
digital currency exchange in the USA is begging to go to prison even if
you try to follow the law. You need to figure out how much tax you owe,
etc. If you make a new drug it needs to be approved by the FDA. There
are regulations and laws galore, you are naive as hell if you think
drugs being illegal to sell is the only way that the government
strangles businesses.
So
Alternative B being you just release a new untested drug on the
unsuspecting populous and then hide behind libertarianism when they
start dying?
... As you're simultaneously surfing and buying (unknown) shit off SR. lol
Hypocrite?
And
there's always a 50:1 male/female ratio at libertarian meetups, to
boot. That tells ya something. And that 1 female has some
major daddy issues.
Like your occupy chicks are real gems...
-
Except taxes are not theft. They are a pool of resource needed for the common good.
In
the Libertarian world my partner - ill with Multiple Sclerosis -
wouldn't die. No. She'd be on a path of increasing, permanent,
disability because I can't afford to purchase the thousands of pounds
worth of medicine she takes each and every month. Basically blind in a
wheelchair, with increasing pain. She worked before illness, I worked a
well paying job for decades. For years and years each of us put into the
system vastly more than either of us ever withdrew. It would have been
fine with each of us if neither of us ever saw "value" for that
taxation. But as she's the "lucky" one in a million to come down with a
horrific illness it's nice that social pool of tax money is available.
And
no, the money alone we put in wouldn't have been enough to cover all
the costs. That's the point of spreading the cost over a larger user
base. The larger the base the lower any individual contribution.
Fairness would suggest the richer paid more than the poorer, as I did.
Progressive taxation is the pinnacle of an insurance scheme like that.
This
is, ultimately, why Libertarianism is a load of wank that only healthy
young people straight from momma's spare room seem to guzzle up.
Oh
yes, your taxation also pays for the jails and the police. No taxation
and the cops go home and the prisoners get let out. I don't give three
flying fucks how hard you say or think you are, that's a lot arse rape
you have to face immediately prior to the *ACTUAL* theft of *ALL* your
good shit. And, with a bleeding anus no hospital will treat, and no
possessions, just you wait till they light your home on fire.
No
Libertarian fireman is going to come out and put out that fire out of a
sense of altruism... and you don't got shit to PAY with... so he'll
SHRUG LIKE ATLAS and watch that motherfucker BURN!
This is not to
say there is nothing about Libertarianism that's worthwhile. But it's
like any doctrine or creed - Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism,
Capitalism, Communism, whatever, - the fanatics are destructive
weirdoes. Always. Because they're fanatic. And weird.
First... let me incinerate your straw-man: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volunteer_fire_department#United_States
"69 percent of firefighters in the United States are volunteers"
"In
the United States, the Department of Labor classifies volunteer
firefighters as firefighters that receive no compensation or nominal
fees up to 20% of the compensation a full-time firefighter would receive
in the same capacity"
Yeah... obviously the world would just burn down and bodies would pile up in the streets.
And since you think writing fictional red herrings equates to factual reality, let me take a shot at some of my own fiction...
In
the Libertarian world your partner - ill with Multiple Sclerosis -
wouldn't die. No. She'd be on a path of increasing, permanent, health...
because someone like me without the weight of the FDA et al. on my
back, was able to create a cheap cure. The End.
Talk about
weird... The only reason you fear ass rape is because you're not allowed
to protect yourself; FYI no need to fear that when you're carrying an
M-4. But it's fine with me if you prefer to watch and wait (20
minutes?) for police while your wife is being gang banged... that is, if
you're even able to make the call. Whatever floats your boat,
bud.
-
Once
I saw an interview with two African Americans. Kidney failure was about
to take both of their lives. Nevertheless, they did not want some
random person to be killed so they could harvest two working kidneys.
You just gotta LAUGH.
Exactly the same except (a) my story happened and (b) my story didn't require harm to a third party for his medical treatment?
You
think sending armed thugs with guns to rob people doesn't cause harm to
the robbed person? Where do you think the money for socialized health
care comes from? It comes from tax dollars. Tax dollars that are
collected by the IRS. If you don't pay taxes they will come and
arrest you. If you resist arrest they will point guns at you. Socialized
health care is funded by armed robberies.
People
that do not get health insurance get sick. THEY go to the ERs of county
hospitals for colds and flu and ear infections thus driving up MY
health care costs. The "choice" to be uninsured is funded by depriving
me and anyone else. How is that any better?
Some people are so maladjusted and antisocial that they only stop harming others at gunpoint. What's the news?
How
are you deprived by someone else being uninsured? Do you own the
hospital? The hospital can decide who they treat and who they do not
treat, it is their right. If they don't want to treat people who cannot
afford it, then that is up to them as well. Nobody is depriving you of
shit, you want to deprive others of the right to not be insured and
apparently you want to deprive the hospital of the right to treat
whoever they want. You are the one who wants to use guns pointed at
others to solve all of your problems, regardless of if you want to point
the gun at a person without insurance or at the doctor who decides to
treat people without insurance. You are the one who wants to use guns
for your own benefit.
Utter bullshit,
hospitals
are required to provide emergency care under the Medical Treatment and
Active Labor Act passed in 1986. That act became necessary because in
the world you fantasize about "admissions officers" would ask bleeding
people for an insurance/credit card and send them off to die on the
corner if they had neither. Some utopia... you can keep that.
No
matter what your stance on this is, whether it is morally okay to let
people die or not, whether you favor socialistic or libertarian
approaches, no libertarian ever answers the question, what do you do
with the uninsured if they have an emergency? Do you just let them die
on the road? How long do you think it will take until the mob starts
rioting in the street if you have uncle Bobs and granny Maples dieing in
the streets everywhere? All libertarians offer is some metaphysical
insinuation that somehow this will sort itself out if only regulation is
removed. Might as well try praying...
Clearly
you've never had a huge bill from a hospital in the US before... a
charity may help you out. (and in many cases, they will)
You
commies/socialists make libertarians out to be the cold ruthless ones,
when it is you that are. People being responsible for their
actions will only lead to more charity and altruistic philanthropy, not
less. This is proven by the US people being more charitable
than you more socialist types. By far, monetarily. And
monetarily, 75% of this charity comes from private individuals.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/12/19/world-giving-index-us-ran_n_1159562.html
http://www.american.com/archive/2008/march-april-magazine-contents/a-nation-of-givers
Dead bodies will not be piling up, at least not in the US...
"what do you do with the uninsured if they have an emergency?"
Doctors
will treat patients because they want to treat them... because it's why
they became doctors in the first place, to help. Money is
not the primary issue with us, even-though apparently it is with
you.
-
In
the Libertarian world your partner - ill with Multiple Sclerosis -
wouldn't die. No. She'd be on a path of increasing, permanent, health...
because someone like me without the weight of the FDA et al. on my
back, was able to create a cheap cure. The End.
Talk about
weird... The only reason you fear ass rape is because you're not allowed
to protect yourself; FYI no need to fear that when you're carrying an
M-4.
Of
course how foolish of us. Without the jackboot of government tyranny on
our neck all diseases would be cured, average income in real terms
would quadruple and wine would fall from the sky like rain. And of
course you would never have to worry about anything because you would
have a big fucking gun.
You have pretty much summed up the quality of libertarian thought.
-
By the way I suspect the reason that US citizens are more charitable
is because they need to be, as their government is failing to care for
its less fortunate citizens properly.
It is
always amusing the way libertarians characterise anyone who disagrees
with their extremist philosophy as communist. We are not communist or
socialist. It's just our culture hasn't taken as big a swing to the
right as yours in the past 40 years. In the 50s and 60s the US
government enjoyed the greatest period of growth in recent history while
enacting policies that you would no doubt characterise as extreme
socialism.
-
Doctors
will treat patients because they want to treat them... because it's why
they became doctors in the first place, to help. Money is
not the primary issue with us, even-though apparently it is with you.
This
is very reminiscent of the response to someone asking a communist, "why
would anyone bother to become successful if everyone is paid the same?"
The response is often , "well someone would become a doctor because they want to help people rather than for money, for example"
As has been said already, these stonewall ideologies are always naive "in an ideal world..." type philosophies.
-
According to a Harvard study medical bills is the biggest and most
prevalent cause of bankruptcy filings in the US accounting for 62.1% of
all personal bankruptcies filed. Poor and/or excessive/irresponsible use
of credit only ranks at number three. I guess there is less charity
than you thought then maybe? Even more peculiar, the study found that
78% of those cases involved people that actually had paid for some form
of health insurance.
But hey, at least we aren't under the
tyranny of having to suffer regulations that would force insurers to do
what you paid for instead of finding reasons to drop you off the plan so
the ever-present and abundantly available charities can take over.
/sarcasm
***CLEARNET***
http://www.law.harvard.edu/programs/petrie-flom/workshop/pdf/warren.pdf
***CLEARNET***
So,
basically, that whole wall of text tl;dr rant of "commie circle jerks"
was nothing but the usual semi-illiterate ideologically charged
ramblings one usually gets to hear on the intarwebz.
-
+1000
This whole thread has turned into a socialist circle jerk. That's why I stopped posting in here. Well except for this ;)
Sounds to me like you just want a big mud slinging socialist circle jerk...
-
+1000
This whole thread has turned into a socialist circle jerk. That's why I stopped posting in here. Well except for this ;)
Sounds to me like you just want a big mud slinging socialist circle jerk...
Communist
circle jerk - Translation: I ran out of or didn't have in the first
place any empirical arguments and my unfounded unproven assertions
aren't treated as "fact" hence I pout and leave dropping something
derogatory on my way out the door...
Very "libertarian" :P
-
That's fucking hilarious considering that you *****ignored*****
EVERY SINGLE EMPIRICAL ARGUMENT of mine from earlier in this thread!!!
But you're an epic hypocrite so that's just par for the course, isn't it? ;)
+1000
This whole thread has turned into a socialist circle jerk. That's why I stopped posting in here. Well except for this ;)
Sounds to me like you just want a big mud slinging socialist circle jerk...
Communist
circle jerk - Translation: I ran out of or didn't have in the first
place any empirical arguments and my unfounded unproven assertions
aren't treated as "fact" hence I pout and leave dropping something
derogatory on my way out the door...
Very "libertarian" :P
-
That's
fucking hilarious considering that you *****ignored***** EVERY SINGLE
EMPIRICAL ARGUMENT of mine from earlier in this thread!!!
But you're an epic hypocrite so that's just par for the course, isn't it? ;)
+1000
This whole thread has turned into a socialist circle jerk. That's why I stopped posting in here. Well except for this ;)
Sounds to me like you just want a big mud slinging socialist circle jerk...
Communist
circle jerk - Translation: I ran out of or didn't have in the first
place any empirical arguments and my unfounded unproven assertions
aren't treated as "fact" hence I pout and leave dropping something
derogatory on my way out the door...
Very "libertarian" :P
Uhm,
whilst I appreciate exchanging thoughts with you and respect your
opinions I do have to say that in my humble opinion you just might have
to read up on the definition of "empirical" maybe? ...... :)
<3
-
Adjective
empirical (not comparable)
Pertaining to or based on experience.
Pertaining to, derived from, or testable by observations made
using the physical senses or using instruments which extend the senses.
(philosophy of science) Verifiable by means of scientific experimentation.
Which
is exactly what I did and you decided to completely ignore what I had
to say. I guess it's just more convenient to pretend arguments that you
disagree with don't exist or "aren't empirical" than to actually take
the time to address them.
I appreciate exchanging thoughts with you
And
when have you ever exchanged thoughts with me?? If you bothered to
respond to any of my (referenced, empirical) arguments then that would
be true.
and respect your opinions
No you don't. Is that some kind of a joke? ::)
-
Clearly
you've never had a huge bill from a hospital in the US before... a
charity may help you out. (and in many cases, they will)
Did you really advocate the "rely on charity" system of state healthcare? Did you... really?
-
Clearly
you've never had a huge bill from a hospital in the US before... a
charity may help you out. (and in many cases, they will)
Did you really advocate the "rely on charity" system of state healthcare? Did you... really?
It's
the magic unicorn of libertarianism buddy, donchu know? It's there!
It's true! It happens! But as any shy mythical, magical or religious
creature it only comes out when it feels unwatched! It will only show
itself when any and all regulation is abandoned! Also, people will stop
murdering each other if only you'd remove laws against murder.
Everyone will start to behave well if only we'd remove "regulations" against behaving bad.
Boy if ever a horse was saddled from the rear...
-
....people will stop murdering each other if only you'd remove laws against murder.
Libertarian
thought today is loosely based upon the Constitution. That means very
limited government. Not ZERO government which would be anarchy. Basic
laws would be in place to protect life, liberty and private property.
Fraud, murder, rape, assault, abduction, extortion, property destruction
and pollution would all be covered by these laws and fully punishable
by criminal penalties. Civil penalties would also apply under a modified
court system where the plaintiff and defendant would be on equal
footing unlike how it is today. All trade, production and creation would
be completely unregulated and no permission would be needed from the
government to do any of those things. Money would be completely
unregulated and untracked. Legal tender laws would be thrown in the
trash heap of history and people would be able to trade amongst
themselves however they see fit with whichever currencies they choose.
They could even introduce their very own currencies for this purpose.
The terrible distortion of the money supply that's fucking up everything
today would almost instantly cease to exist when that happened. So
would the capacity for the government to wage war domestically and
internationally. And government's ability to expand would be halted.
Permanently.
This would lead to a minimum reduction in the size
of government of 90%. Taxes would plummet accordingly and so would the
prison population. I don't know about you but that's the kind of world I
want to live in. The current one is turning into an Orwellian nightmare
with unlimited government crushing anything and everything in its path
that is seen as a threat to the fascist Establishment. Unlimited wars.
Unlimited taxes. Unlimited debt. Unlimited destruction. FUCK THAT.
-
Oh it sounds awesome! Sign me up, I'd love all that! Seriously, I mean it.
But
then again, as the original poster has so astutely observed, it has one
fundamental chink, the very same chink communism had.................
it fails to account for human nature, and stipulates that some
superordinate metaphysical mechanism will make it all right somehow.
The
power amassed by the few is so tremendous that no market mechanism in
the world could possible provide a level playing field. Look at the US,
do you think people will start moving away from their jobs and homes
because they are unhappy with the fact that there is only one utilities
provider in any given region establishing defacto pricing monopolies? Do
you think people will give up careers to move somewhere else where
another cable provider provides better internet speeds? These issues
aren't caused by government, they are caused by entities becoming so big
and powerful that it becomes cheaper to outspend upcoming competition
than to innovate.
That is the problem with this whole libertarian
thought. Wealth and power are too concentrated already. They can
leverage any market dynamic simply by outspending it.
Yes,
nowadays governments are pretty much shite and they make shite policies,
but, please do tell if you will, since most governments are big-corp
pwns these days, what makes you think that the very big corp entities
that buy up entire governments would behave better if you were to remove
the last couple restrictions that are placed on them? Do you think
anyone in big oil, big power, big healthcare is even still susceptible
to 100, 500, 100, 10,000 rage-quitters? They fart on that!
There
is no invention or market interruption in sight that would theoretically
allow for new players to become so succesful in basically anything that
they would be able to shake up the top 10% of the global money
machines.
How would you handle that? How would these libertarian
market mechanisms ensure that the required market interruptions would be
met with innovation instead of being simply smothered with a money
pillow?
I like these libertarian ideas, I really do. Gosh who
wouldn't want to live in a "fair" world like that. The thing is though,
it's simply unrealistic and unfeasible. There is no empirical evidence
in history whatsoever that would indicate that abandoning the vast
majority of regulations would indeed improve anything for anyone except
the top 10% money elite of the world. The division of labor has advanced
way too fast to be leveraged by mechanisms that may have worked well in
a world of Peter builds cabinets, George is a doctor, Peter is sick and
George needs a new cabinet, Susan adds a chicken for some medicine.
Ever
since humans started banding together to hunt mammoth the same
structures emerged, from pack leaders to dukes and counts and kings to
presidents and chancellors and central committee secretaries to
CEO/CFOs. Different systems, same effect.
The only way to
counteract this ever-emerging pattern of suppression of the many by the
few is found in proper social democracies (provided people are engaged
enough and educated enough to properly vote for their interest).
All
these changes interwebz-libertarians suggest these days would lead to
nothing else but going back to oppresive aristocracies, except now we'd
call counts CFOs, dukes HR managers and Kings CEOs.
-
....it
fails to account for human nature, and stipulates that some
superordinate metaphysical mechanism will make it all right somehow.
And
the "superordinate metaphysical mechanism" you're talking about can
somehow be replaced by government?? Don't you see the irony of your
statement? ::)
....do
you think people will start moving away from their jobs and homes
because they are unhappy with the fact that there is only one utilities
provider in any given region establishing defacto pricing monopolies? Do
you think people will give up careers to move somewhere else where
another cable provider provides better internet speeds? These issues
aren't caused by government....
Your
arguments really crack me up. You DO know that utilities and cable
operators are heavily regulated by the government right? And that those
heavy regulations pose a very high and very artificial barrier to entry
to would be competitors? And that they were GRANTED their pricing
monopolies (not defacto- it's the law!!!) by government power
right? ;D
Wealth and power are too concentrated already.
Yes.
This wealth and power has been generated from crony capitalism thugs
who are part of the revolving door of government. It's happened BECAUSE
of the current corrupt fascist system. Not in spite of it like you're
implying.
....what
makes you think that the very big corp entities that buy up entire
governments would behave better if you were to remove the last couple
restrictions that are placed on them?
Again,
you seem to think that these regulations somehow hold back or impede
these companies from wreaking havoc on the economy and the people. These
regulations ARE NOT ENFORCED on the fascists. They're SELECTIVELY
ENFORCED on their competitors. That is the best example of a playing
field that is so unlevel it's fucking vertical instead of horizontal!!!
Honestly, please read this paragraph very carefully since it cuts right
to the heart of one of your biggest misconceptions about the current
system of government we have in place.
There
is no invention or market interruption in sight that would
theoretically allow for new players to become so succesful in basically
anything that they would be able to shake up the top 10% of the global
money machines.
Really?
Lookup "The Internet" sometime. Or something insignificant called
"Desktop Computers". And unknown losers like Bill Gates, Steve Jobs and
tens of thousands of much lesser known losers who clearly didn't make
any money without helpful regulation and didn't contribute anything of
importance to society.
How
would you handle that? How would these libertarian market mechanisms
ensure that the required market interruptions would be met with
innovation instead of being simply smothered with a money pillow?
Where is this money pillow and how can I be smothered with it? ;D
There
is no empirical evidence in history whatsoever that would indicate that
abandoning the vast majority of regulations would indeed improve
anything for anyone except the top 10% money elite of the world.
Nothing
except America of course. The greatest inventions of all time have
happened when government stayed the fuck OUT of the market and let the
market work things out for itself. The greatest expansion of wealth in
history (for EVERYONE which established the middle class) happened from
the start of the 19th century until its end. And the single greatest 20
year expansion happened from the early 1870s until the early 1890s. A
lot of bad things started happening during the first 20 years of the
20th. I'll let you guess what.
The computer and internet
evolution was also huge and comes third to those other periods. If they
never happened then we'd already be in a deep great depression right
now.
Ever
since humans started banding together to hunt mammoth the same
structures emerged, from pack leaders to dukes and counts and kings to
presidents and chancellors and central committee secretaries to
CEO/CFOs. Different systems, same effect.
The only way to
counteract this ever-emerging pattern of suppression of the many by the
few is found in proper social democracies (provided people are engaged
enough and educated enough to properly vote for their interest).
And
where the fuck does a "proper social democracy" with people who are
"engaged enough and educated enough to properly vote for their interest"
exist today??? Talk about something that's "unrealistic and unfeasible"
as you called libertarianism!! :o ::)
All
these changes interwebz-libertarians suggest these days would lead to
nothing else but going back to oppresive aristocracies, except now we'd
call counts CFOs, dukes HR managers and Kings CEOs.
And
what did I ever say which suggested this bullshit you're claiming??
Again you're lumping in fascism with libertarianism. Why do you keep on
doing that? You're not convincing anybody. As for armchair libertarians,
I've already said before that MANY people who ARE ANYTHING BUT
libertarians call themselves that. Give me the names of some libertarian
scholars who promote what you claim they're saying and then we can
talk.
-
And
the "superordinate metaphysical mechanism" you're talking about can
somehow be replaced by government?? Don't you see the irony of your
statement?
Not
at all, but it needs to be regulated and moderated, because just as any
other physical, political or economic self-sustaining system it will
tend to favor the path of least resistance. In economic terms, over time
money will only go to where money already is, this mechanism will
perpetuate until the system collapses.
Your
arguments really crack me up. You DO know that utilities and cable
operators are heavily regulated by the government right? And that those
heavy regulations pose a very high and very artificial barrier to entry
to would be competitors? And that they were GRANTED their pricing
monopolies (not defacto- it's the law!!!) by government power right?
You
are operating under the wrong assumption. Government did not wake up
one morning saying OH HAI, lets regulate power! If you care to read up
on these "cartels" you will find that what happened first was the
hostile culling of those markets my the financially strongest operators
in an attempt to wipe out all local competition to achieve price
dominion. Then followed the regulations in order to achieve at least
some form of price stability. Government had to jump in here,
otherwise you'd be paying two thirds of your paycheck for power. Why?
Because they can!
Yes.
This wealth and power has been generated from crony capitalism thugs
who are part of the revolving door of government. It's happened BECAUSE
of the current corrupt fascist system. Not in spite of it like you're
implying.
So
what's your solution? How do you hit the reset button and go to
"libertarian" approaches? Redistribute the wealth maybe? :P Oh no wait,
that was the other side.
Again,
you seem to think that these regulations somehow hold back or impede
these companies from wreaking havoc on the economy and the people. These
regulations ARE NOT ENFORCED on the fascists. They're SELECTIVELY
ENFORCED on their competitors. That is the best example of a playing
field that is so unlevel it's fucking vertical instead of horizontal!!!
Honestly, please read this paragraph very carefully since it cuts right
to the heart of one of your biggest misconceptions about the current
system of government we have in place.
You
got that one upside-down too. If you want to see just how much havoc
these multinationals are willing to wreak just compare oil extraction by
BP in the US and in South Africa. Same company, same management. Except
over in the states there is at least some semblance of responsibility
whereas they poison and destroy without a second thought. The only thing
keeping them from creating a polluted uninhabitable wasteland like they
do in Africa is regulations and government sanctions. (not half-enough
if you ask me)
Really?
Lookup "The Internet" sometime. Or something insignificant called
"Desktop Computers". And unknown losers like Bill Gates, Steve Jobs and
tens of thousands of much lesser known losers who clearly didn't make
any money without helpful regulation and didn't contribute anything of
importance to society.
You
know it's really funny that you should mention 2 inventions that came
out of publicly funded government labs to state your case. The Internet?
That's defense technology out of DARPA, the PC? Government funded
research. Business didn't want anything to do with it. Too big, too
pricey, to unreliable. Bill Gates? Uhm, well yeah, 5 years of inventin'
and inovatin' followed by decades of using one big break to buy everyone
else up or sue them into oblivion. Thanks for proving my point.
Where is this money pillow and how can I be smothered with it?
Yeah, you and me both ;D
Nothing
except America of course. The greatest inventions of all time have
happened when government stayed the fuck OUT of the market and let the
market work things out for itself. The greatest expansion of wealth in
history (for EVERYONE which established the middle class) happened from
the start of the 19th century until its end. And the single greatest 20
year expansion happened from the early 1870s until the early 1890s. A
lot of bad things started happening during the first 20 years of the
20th. I'll let you guess what.
The computer and internet
evolution was also huge and comes third to those other periods. If they
never happened then we'd already be in a deep great depression right
now.
Ah
the 18's early 19's, yeah you are right. The dawn of industrialization
combined with slavery, what a wealth machine. Glad government staid out
of it, rite? :P The of course the computer and Internet again, but then
we have already established that those came straight out of government
research and were only picked up by business after governments did the
heavy lifting in terms of early development and decided to release the
research to the public.
And
where the fuck does a "proper social democracy" with people who are
"engaged enough and educated enough to properly vote for their interest"
exist today??? Talk about something that's "unrealistic and unfeasible"
as you called libertarianism!!
Nowhere,
haven't claimed there is. Some of the Nordic countries come pretty
close though, but I guess they would be "dem hated commies" in your
view.
And
what did I ever say which suggested this bullshit you're claiming??
Again you're lumping in fascism with libertarianism. Why do you keep on
doing that? You're not convincing anybody. As for armchair libertarians,
I've already said before that MANY people who ARE ANYTHING BUT
libertarians call themselves that. Give me the names of some libertarian
scholars who promote what you claim they're saying and then we can
talk.
I
think your returning to "fascism" as a talking point should give you
some food for thought. Maybe the flavor of libertarianism you'd favor,
where capital rules obviously, is nothing but some form of reversed
fascism, a fascism of the capital so to speak. If you believe this "the
Ponderosa Ranch sells bad steaks so people stop buying from Ponderosa
all is well" is by any means realistic I'd probably label you as naive.
-
Clearly
you've never had a huge bill from a hospital in the US before... a
charity may help you out. (and in many cases, they will)
Did you really advocate the "rely on charity" system of state healthcare? Did you... really?
It's
the magic unicorn of libertarianism buddy, donchu know? It's there!
It's true! It happens! But as any shy mythical, magical or religious
creature it only comes out when it feels unwatched! It will only show
itself when any and all regulation is abandoned! Also, people will stop
murdering each other if only you'd remove laws against murder.
Everyone will start to behave well if only we'd remove "regulations" against behaving bad.
Boy if ever a horse was saddled from the rear...
Well
hopefully it happens, but if it doesn't it is better that people should
get sick and die than that we organize armed robbers to steal from
everybody in order to fund health care. I would rather a hundred sick
people die than somebody sticks a gun in a rich persons face to save
them.
-
By
the way I suspect the reason that US citizens are more charitable is
because they need to be, as their government is failing to care for its
less fortunate citizens properly.
It is always
amusing the way libertarians characterise anyone who disagrees with
their extremist philosophy as communist. We are not communist or
socialist. It's just our culture hasn't taken as big a swing to the
right as yours in the past 40 years. In the 50s and 60s the US
government enjoyed the greatest period of growth in recent history while
enacting policies that you would no doubt characterise as extreme
socialism.
Libertarianism
is not right wing. The political system is best thought of as a
diamond. It has left-right and up-down. Liberalism is to the left,
Conservatism to the right. Authoritarianism is to the top,
Libertarianism is to the bottom. At the top and bottom, the distinction
between left and right goes away. Anarchy is at the very bottom of the
spectrum. It is not really left or right wing. Libertarians are as
socially liberal as the most extreme liberals and as financially
conservative as the most extreme conservatives. Libertarianism is hated
by the left and the right because it is the extreme opposite of what
they are in one category, and extremely beyond what most of them are in
the other.
Personally though I am a Totalibertarian. I don't see
why I cannot be a libertarian and a totalitarian. I think that
libertarians should take control of the world, with violence if
required, and enforce extreme libertarianism. All theft, including
taxation, should be strictly outlawed. Anybody who tries to steal,
including tax, should be treated as a criminal and punished. All drugs
should be legal, there should be absolutely no regulation on drugs,
anybody who tries to use illegitimate force to prevent a person from
selling a drug should be treated as a criminal and punished. All
information should be free, anybody who tries to use violence to tell
another person what they may say or look at in the privacy of their own
home should be treated as a criminal and punished.
A big problem
with libertarianism is that a lot of libertarians confuse it with
pacifism. Libertarians are too honest of people and too good of people,
whereas mostly everybody else is a lying stealing fascist sack of shit,
willing to lie to idiots to brainwash them (democracy, religion),
willing to steal money from people to fund their own desires
(liberals/communists), willing to use violence to rob people and oppress
people, etc. Libertarians need to come to recognize that it is the ENDS
of these people that are wrong, not the means. There is nothing wrong
with putting a gun in the face of a thief and telling him he cannot
steal, there is nothing wrong with violently overthrowing an oppressive
government and its police if they are against liberty, there is nothing
wrong with "brainwashing" (educating in the case of libertarianism) the
people into libertarian goals. So I consider myself a Totalibertarian (a
term someone else coined for my political philosophy), and I think we
need a probably violent global movement to seize control of the world
and enforce libertarianism with an iron fist.
-
By
the way I suspect the reason that US citizens are more charitable is
because they need to be, as their government is failing to care for its
less fortunate citizens properly.
It is always
amusing the way libertarians characterise anyone who disagrees with
their extremist philosophy as communist. We are not communist or
socialist. It's just our culture hasn't taken as big a swing to the
right as yours in the past 40 years. In the 50s and 60s the US
government enjoyed the greatest period of growth in recent history while
enacting policies that you would no doubt characterise as extreme
socialism.
Libertarianism
is not right wing. The political system is best thought of as a
diamond. It has left-right and up-down. Liberalism is to the left,
Conservatism to the right. Authoritarianism is to the top,
Libertarianism is to the bottom. At the top and bottom, the distinction
between left and right goes away. Anarchy is at the very bottom of the
spectrum. It is not really left or right wing. Libertarians are as
socially liberal as the most extreme liberals and as financially
conservative as the most extreme conservatives. Libertarianism is hated
by the left and the right because it is the extreme opposite of what
they are in one category, and extremely beyond what most of them are in
the other.
Personally though I am a Totalibertarian. I don't see
why I cannot be a libertarian and a totalitarian. I think that
libertarians should take control of the world, with violence if
required, and enforce extreme libertarianism. All theft, including
taxation, should be strictly outlawed. Anybody who tries to steal,
including tax, should be treated as a criminal and punished. All drugs
should be legal, there should be absolutely no regulation on drugs,
anybody who tries to use illegitimate force to prevent a person from
selling a drug should be treated as a criminal and punished. All
information should be free, anybody who tries to use violence to tell
another person what they may say or look at in the privacy of their own
home should be treated as a criminal and punished.
A big problem
with libertarianism is that a lot of libertarians confuse it with
pacifism. Libertarians are too honest of people and too good of people,
whereas mostly everybody else is a lying stealing fascist sack of shit,
willing to lie to idiots to brainwash them (democracy, religion),
willing to steal money from people to fund their own desires
(liberals/communists), willing to use violence to rob people and oppress
people, etc. Libertarians need to come to recognize that it is the ENDS
of these people that are wrong, not the means. There is nothing wrong
with putting a gun in the face of a thief and telling him he cannot
steal, there is nothing wrong with violently overthrowing an oppressive
government and its police if they are against liberty, there is nothing
wrong with "brainwashing" (educating in the case of libertarianism) the
people into libertarian goals. So I consider myself a Totalibertarian (a
term someone else coined for my political philosophy), and I think we
need a probably violent global movement to seize control of the world
and enforce libertarianism with an iron fist.
Liber-Qaeda ...
-
No, Totalibertarians are against terrorism and hope to struggle
against the terroristic states to overthrow them from power. We also
against the terrorists in society and want to smash them into
submission. Once we take over the world libertarianism will be strictly
enforced, and even if 80% of the world says they want something
different well they can get fucked. Totalibertarianism is a benevolent
dictatorship with visions of global domination. We will violently force
the world to be free and relentlessly punish those who do not want it to
be. People can beg us to allow slavery, they can vote for slavery in
overwhelming numbers, but we will tell them they cannot have it. The
people can beg us and plead with us to censor information, but we will
tell them that information is free regardless of what they wish. The
people can protest us telling us we must allow them to steal, but we
will never allow this to happen regardless of how much they beg and
plead with us. Society can say that their social contract said people
cannot use drugs, and we will laugh hysterically at them and say that we
have revoked their social contract. Wealth and prosperity will sweep
the nations, people will be full in the streets, and as much as they beg
us otherwise we will not allow it. When the supporters of the state
move to arrest prostitutes we will immediately charge them with
kidnapping and send them to rot in prison. When they try to steal drugs
from drug dealers we will charge them with armed robbery and send them
to rot in prison. When they try to arrest people for viewing pictures,
be they of muhammed or naked 15 year olds, we will charge them with
kidnapping and send them to prisons. Indeed we will build massive
prisons on isolated islands and ship all of the loyalists of the state
to them, where they will live a life of modest inconvenience until they
are educated as to the wrongness of their deeds (although we may need a
purge of some of them, to make a statement against the freedom they have
allowed!).
Trust me, in a totalibertarian society there is no
freedom of the people. They can want to rob and kill and murder and
oppress and we will not allow it, despite the wishes of the majority! We
will use giant weapons and a massive force of soldiers to rip the
freedom to oppress from the people. In Totalibertarianism, there is no
individual choice, an individual can not choose to steal from others or
to oppress others. Only the laws of the Worlds Totalibertarian Army
matter at all, and it does not matter how many others are against them
they will be violently enforced across the world.
-
No,
Totalibertarians are against terrorism and hope to struggle against the
terroristic states to overthrow them from power. We also against the
terrorists in society and want to smash them into submission. Once we
take over the world libertarianism will be strictly enforced, and even
if 80% of the world says they want something different well they can get
fucked. Totalibertarianism is a benevolent dictatorship with visions of
global domination. We will violently force the world to be free and
relentlessly punish those who do not want it to be. People can beg us to
allow slavery, they can vote for slavery in overwhelming numbers, but
we will tell them they cannot have it. The people can beg us and plead
with us to censor information, but we will tell them that information is
free regardless of what they wish. The people can protest us telling us
we must allow them to steal, but we will never allow this to happen
regardless of how much they beg and plead with us. Society can say that
their social contract said people cannot use drugs, and we will laugh
hysterically at them and say that we have revoked their social contract.
Wealth and prosperity will sweep the nations, people will be full in
the streets, and as much as they beg us otherwise we will not allow it.
When the supporters of the state move to arrest prostitutes we will
immediately charge them with kidnapping and send them to rot in prison.
When they try to steal drugs from drug dealers we will charge them with
armed robbery and send them to rot in prison. When they try to arrest
people for viewing pictures, be they of muhammed or naked 15 year olds,
we will charge them with kidnapping and send them to prisons. Indeed we
will build massive prisons on isolated islands and ship all of the
loyalists of the state to them, where they will live a life of modest
inconvenience until they are educated as to the wrongness of their deeds
(although we may need a purge of some of them, to make a statement
against the freedom they have allowed!).
Trust me, in a
totalibertarian society there is no freedom of the people. They can want
to rob and kill and murder and oppress and we will not allow it,
despite the wishes of the majority! We will use giant weapons and a
massive force of soldiers to rip the freedom to oppress from the people.
In Totalibertarianism, there is no individual choice, an individual can
not choose to steal from others or to oppress others. Only the laws of
the Worlds Totalibertarian Army matter at all, and it does not matter
how many others are against them they will be violently enforced across
the world.
LMAO!
Dude...I seriously don't know if you're kidding or not...but if I could
give you Karma I would...not because I agree (I don't), but because the
way you're saying all this is just so damn funny! Top
notch! :-)
"A man came up to me and said I'd like to change your mind, by hitting it with this rock he said, though I am not unkind"
Whistling in the Dark
They Might be Giants
"In war...you kill people in order to change their minds!"
The movie "Complex World"
Also
as a side note, as the OP I hope you all didn't think I've abandoned
the thread. On the contrary, I've been absolutley enthralled by
the back and forth. So many passionate opinions! So many
thoughtful arguments! This is why I come back to this forumn and
the SR...it's not for the drugs...yeah they're great and all...but it's
the people I like! Wish you all lived down the road so we could
enjoy these discussions over a pint!
Thanks all!
R.
-
No,
Totalibertarians are against terrorism and hope to struggle against the
terroristic states to overthrow them from power. We also against the
terrorists in society and want to smash them into submission. Once we
take over the world libertarianism will be strictly enforced, and even
if 80% of the world says they want something different well they can get
fucked. Totalibertarianism is a benevolent dictatorship with visions of
global domination. We will violently force the world to be free and
relentlessly punish those who do not want it to be. People can beg us to
allow slavery, they can vote for slavery in overwhelming numbers, but
we will tell them they cannot have it. The people can beg us and plead
with us to censor information, but we will tell them that information is
free regardless of what they wish. The people can protest us telling us
we must allow them to steal, but we will never allow this to happen
regardless of how much they beg and plead with us. Society can say that
their social contract said people cannot use drugs, and we will laugh
hysterically at them and say that we have revoked their social contract.
Wealth and prosperity will sweep the nations, people will be full in
the streets, and as much as they beg us otherwise we will not allow it.
When the supporters of the state move to arrest prostitutes we will
immediately charge them with kidnapping and send them to rot in prison.
When they try to steal drugs from drug dealers we will charge them with
armed robbery and send them to rot in prison. When they try to arrest
people for viewing pictures, be they of muhammed or naked 15 year olds,
we will charge them with kidnapping and send them to prisons. Indeed we
will build massive prisons on isolated islands and ship all of the
loyalists of the state to them, where they will live a life of modest
inconvenience until they are educated as to the wrongness of their deeds
(although we may need a purge of some of them, to make a statement
against the freedom they have allowed!).
Trust me, in a
totalibertarian society there is no freedom of the people. They can want
to rob and kill and murder and oppress and we will not allow it,
despite the wishes of the majority! We will use giant weapons and a
massive force of soldiers to rip the freedom to oppress from the people.
In Totalibertarianism, there is no individual choice, an individual can
not choose to steal from others or to oppress others. Only the laws of
the Worlds Totalibertarian Army matter at all, and it does not matter
how many others are against them they will be violently enforced across
the world.
HEIL LIBERTY! Quick kids hide, the Liberty SS is on the prowl...
-
No,
Totalibertarians are against terrorism and hope to struggle against the
terroristic states to overthrow them from power. We also against the
terrorists in society and want to smash them into submission. Once we
take over the world libertarianism will be strictly enforced, and even
if 80% of the world says they want something different well they can get
fucked. Totalibertarianism is a benevolent dictatorship with visions of
global domination. We will violently force the world to be free and
relentlessly punish those who do not want it to be. People can beg us to
allow slavery, they can vote for slavery in overwhelming numbers, but
we will tell them they cannot have it. The people can beg us and plead
with us to censor information, but we will tell them that information is
free regardless of what they wish. The people can protest us telling us
we must allow them to steal, but we will never allow this to happen
regardless of how much they beg and plead with us. Society can say that
their social contract said people cannot use drugs, and we will laugh
hysterically at them and say that we have revoked their social contract.
Wealth and prosperity will sweep the nations, people will be full in
the streets, and as much as they beg us otherwise we will not allow it.
When the supporters of the state move to arrest prostitutes we will
immediately charge them with kidnapping and send them to rot in prison.
When they try to steal drugs from drug dealers we will charge them with
armed robbery and send them to rot in prison. When they try to arrest
people for viewing pictures, be they of muhammed or naked 15 year olds,
we will charge them with kidnapping and send them to prisons. Indeed we
will build massive prisons on isolated islands and ship all of the
loyalists of the state to them, where they will live a life of modest
inconvenience until they are educated as to the wrongness of their deeds
(although we may need a purge of some of them, to make a statement
against the freedom they have allowed!).
Trust me, in a
totalibertarian society there is no freedom of the people. They can want
to rob and kill and murder and oppress and we will not allow it,
despite the wishes of the majority! We will use giant weapons and a
massive force of soldiers to rip the freedom to oppress from the people.
In Totalibertarianism, there is no individual choice, an individual can
not choose to steal from others or to oppress others. Only the laws of
the Worlds Totalibertarian Army matter at all, and it does not matter
how many others are against them they will be violently enforced across
the world.
HEIL LIBERTY! Quick kids hide, the Liberty SS is on the prowl...
Kids
do not need to fear Totalibertarianism! Indeed, our policies will be
beneficial for them! The only people who are against Totalibertarianism
are brainwashed, or they are evil people such as thieves. Indeed, no
other political philosophy is as peaceful as ours, or as tolerant as
ours. Nobody has a legitimate reason to fear us or to not support us,
our desire is to abolish all laws other than the most fundamental laws
that no reasonable person could possibly disagree with. We will strictly
ban murder, rape, and stealing, as well as other similar crimes.
However, we are perfectly tolerant of the drug dealers, of the CP
viewers, the drug users, the men who wish to have sex with young people
who are at least old enough to consent, of the racists who wish to
discriminate in hiring practices, of the minority races who do not wish
to be enslaved, of the people who produce and want to keep what they
produce, of the people who do not want to pay extortion money to the
government, the prostitutes and the johns, the religious people who do
not wish to force their religious belief on others as well as the
non-religious people who do not wish for beliefs to be forced onto them,
of the business owners who wish to run their stores how they see fit,
the product inventors who wish for their products to be regulated as
they see fit, the people who wish to use only certified products, the
gays who wish to marry, the people of the world! The list goes on and
on, indeed the peace and tolerance of Totalibertarianism is nearly
infinite in scope!
So you do not need to fear us if you are a
good person, and no children need to run from us. Rather you should run
to us and join us in our global struggle to dominate the world and
enforce the principles of Totalibertarianism, which indeed are
indistinguishable from the principles of Tolerance and Peace.
-
I made a flag for the Worlds Totalibertarian Liberation Army, feel free to make shirts or similar.
http://postimg.org/image/3x7fh25aj/
-
No,
Totalibertarians are against terrorism and hope to struggle against the
terroristic states to overthrow them from power. We also against the
terrorists in society and want to smash them into submission. Once we
take over the world libertarianism will be strictly enforced, and even
if 80% of the world says they want something different well they can get
fucked. Totalibertarianism is a benevolent dictatorship with visions of
global domination. We will violently force the world to be free and
relentlessly punish those who do not want it to be. People can beg us to
allow slavery, they can vote for slavery in overwhelming numbers, but
we will tell them they cannot have it. The people can beg us and plead
with us to censor information, but we will tell them that information is
free regardless of what they wish. The people can protest us telling us
we must allow them to steal, but we will never allow this to happen
regardless of how much they beg and plead with us. Society can say that
their social contract said people cannot use drugs, and we will laugh
hysterically at them and say that we have revoked their social contract.
Wealth and prosperity will sweep the nations, people will be full in
the streets, and as much as they beg us otherwise we will not allow it.
When the supporters of the state move to arrest prostitutes we will
immediately charge them with kidnapping and send them to rot in prison.
When they try to steal drugs from drug dealers we will charge them with
armed robbery and send them to rot in prison. When they try to arrest
people for viewing pictures, be they of muhammed or naked 15 year olds,
we will charge them with kidnapping and send them to prisons. Indeed we
will build massive prisons on isolated islands and ship all of the
loyalists of the state to them, where they will live a life of modest
inconvenience until they are educated as to the wrongness of their deeds
(although we may need a purge of some of them, to make a statement
against the freedom they have allowed!).
Trust me, in a
totalibertarian society there is no freedom of the people. They can want
to rob and kill and murder and oppress and we will not allow it,
despite the wishes of the majority! We will use giant weapons and a
massive force of soldiers to rip the freedom to oppress from the people.
In Totalibertarianism, there is no individual choice, an individual can
not choose to steal from others or to oppress others. Only the laws of
the Worlds Totalibertarian Army matter at all, and it does not matter
how many others are against them they will be violently enforced across
the world.
HEIL LIBERTY! Quick kids hide, the Liberty SS is on the prowl...
Kids
do not need to fear Totalibertarianism! Indeed, our policies will be
beneficial for them! The only people who are against Totalibertarianism
are brainwashed, or they are evil people such as thieves. Indeed, no
other political philosophy is as peaceful as ours, or as tolerant as
ours. Nobody has a legitimate reason to fear us or to not support us,
our desire is to abolish all laws other than the most fundamental laws
that no reasonable person could possibly disagree with. We will strictly
ban murder, rape, and stealing, as well as other similar crimes.
However, we are perfectly tolerant of the drug dealers, of the CP
viewers, the drug users, the men who wish to have sex with young people
who are at least old enough to consent, of the racists who wish to
discriminate in hiring practices, of the minority races who do not wish
to be enslaved, of the people who produce and want to keep what they
produce, of the people who do not want to pay extortion money to the
government, the prostitutes and the johns, the religious people who do
not wish to force their religious belief on others as well as the
non-religious people who do not wish for beliefs to be forced onto them,
of the business owners who wish to run their stores how they see fit,
the product inventors who wish for their products to be regulated as
they see fit, the people who wish to use only certified products, the
gays who wish to marry, the people of the world! The list goes on and
on, indeed the peace and tolerance of Totalibertarianism is nearly
infinite in scope!
So you do not need to fear us if you are a
good person, and no children need to run from us. Rather you should run
to us and join us in our global struggle to dominate the world and
enforce the principles of Totalibertarianism, which indeed are
indistinguishable from the principles of Tolerance and Peace.
Conform with our non-conformity or be dominated...
-
No,
Totalibertarians are against terrorism and hope to struggle against the
terroristic states to overthrow them from power. We also against the
terrorists in society and want to smash them into submission. Once we
take over the world libertarianism will be strictly enforced, and even
if 80% of the world says they want something different well they can get
fucked. Totalibertarianism is a benevolent dictatorship with visions of
global domination. We will violently force the world to be free and
relentlessly punish those who do not want it to be. People can beg us to
allow slavery, they can vote for slavery in overwhelming numbers, but
we will tell them they cannot have it. The people can beg us and plead
with us to censor information, but we will tell them that information is
free regardless of what they wish. The people can protest us telling us
we must allow them to steal, but we will never allow this to happen
regardless of how much they beg and plead with us. Society can say that
their social contract said people cannot use drugs, and we will laugh
hysterically at them and say that we have revoked their social contract.
Wealth and prosperity will sweep the nations, people will be full in
the streets, and as much as they beg us otherwise we will not allow it.
When the supporters of the state move to arrest prostitutes we will
immediately charge them with kidnapping and send them to rot in prison.
When they try to steal drugs from drug dealers we will charge them with
armed robbery and send them to rot in prison. When they try to arrest
people for viewing pictures, be they of muhammed or naked 15 year olds,
we will charge them with kidnapping and send them to prisons. Indeed we
will build massive prisons on isolated islands and ship all of the
loyalists of the state to them, where they will live a life of modest
inconvenience until they are educated as to the wrongness of their deeds
(although we may need a purge of some of them, to make a statement
against the freedom they have allowed!).
Trust me, in a
totalibertarian society there is no freedom of the people. They can want
to rob and kill and murder and oppress and we will not allow it,
despite the wishes of the majority! We will use giant weapons and a
massive force of soldiers to rip the freedom to oppress from the people.
In Totalibertarianism, there is no individual choice, an individual can
not choose to steal from others or to oppress others. Only the laws of
the Worlds Totalibertarian Army matter at all, and it does not matter
how many others are against them they will be violently enforced across
the world.
HEIL LIBERTY! Quick kids hide, the Liberty SS is on the prowl...
Kids
do not need to fear Totalibertarianism! Indeed, our policies will be
beneficial for them! The only people who are against Totalibertarianism
are brainwashed, or they are evil people such as thieves. Indeed, no
other political philosophy is as peaceful as ours, or as tolerant as
ours. Nobody has a legitimate reason to fear us or to not support us,
our desire is to abolish all laws other than the most fundamental laws
that no reasonable person could possibly disagree with. We will strictly
ban murder, rape, and stealing, as well as other similar crimes.
However, we are perfectly tolerant of the drug dealers, of the CP
viewers, the drug users, the men who wish to have sex with young people
who are at least old enough to consent, of the racists who wish to
discriminate in hiring practices, of the minority races who do not wish
to be enslaved, of the people who produce and want to keep what they
produce, of the people who do not want to pay extortion money to the
government, the prostitutes and the johns, the religious people who do
not wish to force their religious belief on others as well as the
non-religious people who do not wish for beliefs to be forced onto them,
of the business owners who wish to run their stores how they see fit,
the product inventors who wish for their products to be regulated as
they see fit, the people who wish to use only certified products, the
gays who wish to marry, the people of the world! The list goes on and
on, indeed the peace and tolerance of Totalibertarianism is nearly
infinite in scope!
So you do not need to fear us if you are a
good person, and no children need to run from us. Rather you should run
to us and join us in our global struggle to dominate the world and
enforce the principles of Totalibertarianism, which indeed are
indistinguishable from the principles of Tolerance and Peace.
Conform with our non-conformity or be dominated...
Do
you think that we should allow the thieves to continue robbing? If the
majority desires so? Should we allow the slave traders to continue to
enslave people for their profits? If the majority so desires? People who
do not conform to Totalibertarianism OUGHT to be dominated. Almost
nobody even wants the level of freedom offered by totalibertarianism, so
it is not like people can say we do not support freedom! In their minds
our problem is that we support too much freedom! Under our rule not
enough people are enslaved! We offer far more freedom than the masses
desire, anyone who does not conform to our policies must be dominated
for the good of human kind. We cannot allow for a democracy to dictate
the laws, democracy is a failed experiment. The only way for a better
society is for the entire world to be dominated by a benevolent force.
Totalibertarianism
is Orwellian in a way. We will use the most advanced technologies and
techniques in order to detect all dissent, which will be squashed like a
bug. This means that robbers and slave traders and rapists and murders
and violent criminals will not be safe, they will be immediately
detected and imprisoned. We will have very little restriction on our
enforcement agencies, and for once in the history of mankind it will be
true when they say if you have done nothing wrong you have nothing to
worry about. We will wipe active dissidents (thieves, robbers, rapists,
etc) off the face of the earth with an unprecedented ruthlessness.
-
No,
Totalibertarians are against terrorism and hope to struggle against the
terroristic states to overthrow them from power. We also against the
terrorists in society and want to smash them into submission. Once we
take over the world libertarianism will be strictly enforced, and even
if 80% of the world says they want something different well they can get
fucked. Totalibertarianism is a benevolent dictatorship with visions of
global domination. We will violently force the world to be free and
relentlessly punish those who do not want it to be. People can beg us to
allow slavery, they can vote for slavery in overwhelming numbers, but
we will tell them they cannot have it. The people can beg us and plead
with us to censor information, but we will tell them that information is
free regardless of what they wish. The people can protest us telling us
we must allow them to steal, but we will never allow this to happen
regardless of how much they beg and plead with us. Society can say that
their social contract said people cannot use drugs, and we will laugh
hysterically at them and say that we have revoked their social contract.
Wealth and prosperity will sweep the nations, people will be full in
the streets, and as much as they beg us otherwise we will not allow it.
When the supporters of the state move to arrest prostitutes we will
immediately charge them with kidnapping and send them to rot in prison.
When they try to steal drugs from drug dealers we will charge them with
armed robbery and send them to rot in prison. When they try to arrest
people for viewing pictures, be they of muhammed or naked 15 year olds,
we will charge them with kidnapping and send them to prisons. Indeed we
will build massive prisons on isolated islands and ship all of the
loyalists of the state to them, where they will live a life of modest
inconvenience until they are educated as to the wrongness of their deeds
(although we may need a purge of some of them, to make a statement
against the freedom they have allowed!).
Trust me, in a
totalibertarian society there is no freedom of the people. They can want
to rob and kill and murder and oppress and we will not allow it,
despite the wishes of the majority! We will use giant weapons and a
massive force of soldiers to rip the freedom to oppress from the people.
In Totalibertarianism, there is no individual choice, an individual can
not choose to steal from others or to oppress others. Only the laws of
the Worlds Totalibertarian Army matter at all, and it does not matter
how many others are against them they will be violently enforced across
the world.
HEIL LIBERTY! Quick kids hide, the Liberty SS is on the prowl...
Kids
do not need to fear Totalibertarianism! Indeed, our policies will be
beneficial for them! The only people who are against Totalibertarianism
are brainwashed, or they are evil people such as thieves. Indeed, no
other political philosophy is as peaceful as ours, or as tolerant as
ours. Nobody has a legitimate reason to fear us or to not support us,
our desire is to abolish all laws other than the most fundamental laws
that no reasonable person could possibly disagree with. We will strictly
ban murder, rape, and stealing, as well as other similar crimes.
However, we are perfectly tolerant of the drug dealers, of the CP
viewers, the drug users, the men who wish to have sex with young people
who are at least old enough to consent, of the racists who wish to
discriminate in hiring practices, of the minority races who do not wish
to be enslaved, of the people who produce and want to keep what they
produce, of the people who do not want to pay extortion money to the
government, the prostitutes and the johns, the religious people who do
not wish to force their religious belief on others as well as the
non-religious people who do not wish for beliefs to be forced onto them,
of the business owners who wish to run their stores how they see fit,
the product inventors who wish for their products to be regulated as
they see fit, the people who wish to use only certified products, the
gays who wish to marry, the people of the world! The list goes on and
on, indeed the peace and tolerance of Totalibertarianism is nearly
infinite in scope!
So you do not need to fear us if you are a
good person, and no children need to run from us. Rather you should run
to us and join us in our global struggle to dominate the world and
enforce the principles of Totalibertarianism, which indeed are
indistinguishable from the principles of Tolerance and Peace.
Conform with our non-conformity or be dominated...
Do
you think that we should allow the thieves to continue robbing? If the
majority desires so? Should we allow the slave traders to continue to
enslave people for their profits? If the majority so desires? People who
do not conform to Totalibertarianism OUGHT to be dominated. Almost
nobody even wants the level of freedom offered by totalibertarianism, so
it is not like people can say we do not support freedom! In their minds
our problem is that we support too much freedom! Under our rule not
enough people are enslaved! We offer far more freedom than the masses
desire, anyone who does not conform to our policies must be dominated
for the good of human kind. We cannot allow for a democracy to dictate
the laws, democracy is a failed experiment. The only way for a better
society is for the entire world to be dominated by a benevolent force.
Totalibertarianism
is Orwellian in a way. We will use the most advanced technologies and
techniques in order to detect all dissent, which will be squashed like a
bug. This means that robbers and slave traders and rapists and murders
and violent criminals will not be safe, they will be immediately
detected and imprisoned. We will have very little restriction on our
enforcement agencies, and for once in the history of mankind it will be
true when they say if you have done nothing wrong you have nothing to
worry about. We will wipe active dissidents (thieves, robbers, rapists,
etc) off the face of the earth with an unprecedented ruthlessness.
Stalin would approve...
-
No,
Totalibertarians are against terrorism and hope to struggle against the
terroristic states to overthrow them from power. We also against the
terrorists in society and want to smash them into submission. Once we
take over the world libertarianism will be strictly enforced, and even
if 80% of the world says they want something different well they can get
fucked. Totalibertarianism is a benevolent dictatorship with visions of
global domination. We will violently force the world to be free and
relentlessly punish those who do not want it to be. People can beg us to
allow slavery, they can vote for slavery in overwhelming numbers, but
we will tell them they cannot have it. The people can beg us and plead
with us to censor information, but we will tell them that information is
free regardless of what they wish. The people can protest us telling us
we must allow them to steal, but we will never allow this to happen
regardless of how much they beg and plead with us. Society can say that
their social contract said people cannot use drugs, and we will laugh
hysterically at them and say that we have revoked their social contract.
Wealth and prosperity will sweep the nations, people will be full in
the streets, and as much as they beg us otherwise we will not allow it.
When the supporters of the state move to arrest prostitutes we will
immediately charge them with kidnapping and send them to rot in prison.
When they try to steal drugs from drug dealers we will charge them with
armed robbery and send them to rot in prison. When they try to arrest
people for viewing pictures, be they of muhammed or naked 15 year olds,
we will charge them with kidnapping and send them to prisons. Indeed we
will build massive prisons on isolated islands and ship all of the
loyalists of the state to them, where they will live a life of modest
inconvenience until they are educated as to the wrongness of their deeds
(although we may need a purge of some of them, to make a statement
against the freedom they have allowed!).
Trust me, in a
totalibertarian society there is no freedom of the people. They can want
to rob and kill and murder and oppress and we will not allow it,
despite the wishes of the majority! We will use giant weapons and a
massive force of soldiers to rip the freedom to oppress from the people.
In Totalibertarianism, there is no individual choice, an individual can
not choose to steal from others or to oppress others. Only the laws of
the Worlds Totalibertarian Army matter at all, and it does not matter
how many others are against them they will be violently enforced across
the world.
HEIL LIBERTY! Quick kids hide, the Liberty SS is on the prowl...
Kids
do not need to fear Totalibertarianism! Indeed, our policies will be
beneficial for them! The only people who are against Totalibertarianism
are brainwashed, or they are evil people such as thieves. Indeed, no
other political philosophy is as peaceful as ours, or as tolerant as
ours. Nobody has a legitimate reason to fear us or to not support us,
our desire is to abolish all laws other than the most fundamental laws
that no reasonable person could possibly disagree with. We will strictly
ban murder, rape, and stealing, as well as other similar crimes.
However, we are perfectly tolerant of the drug dealers, of the CP
viewers, the drug users, the men who wish to have sex with young people
who are at least old enough to consent, of the racists who wish to
discriminate in hiring practices, of the minority races who do not wish
to be enslaved, of the people who produce and want to keep what they
produce, of the people who do not want to pay extortion money to the
government, the prostitutes and the johns, the religious people who do
not wish to force their religious belief on others as well as the
non-religious people who do not wish for beliefs to be forced onto them,
of the business owners who wish to run their stores how they see fit,
the product inventors who wish for their products to be regulated as
they see fit, the people who wish to use only certified products, the
gays who wish to marry, the people of the world! The list goes on and
on, indeed the peace and tolerance of Totalibertarianism is nearly
infinite in scope!
So you do not need to fear us if you are a
good person, and no children need to run from us. Rather you should run
to us and join us in our global struggle to dominate the world and
enforce the principles of Totalibertarianism, which indeed are
indistinguishable from the principles of Tolerance and Peace.
Conform with our non-conformity or be dominated...
Do
you think that we should allow the thieves to continue robbing? If the
majority desires so? Should we allow the slave traders to continue to
enslave people for their profits? If the majority so desires? People who
do not conform to Totalibertarianism OUGHT to be dominated. Almost
nobody even wants the level of freedom offered by totalibertarianism, so
it is not like people can say we do not support freedom! In their minds
our problem is that we support too much freedom! Under our rule not
enough people are enslaved! We offer far more freedom than the masses
desire, anyone who does not conform to our policies must be dominated
for the good of human kind. We cannot allow for a democracy to dictate
the laws, democracy is a failed experiment. The only way for a better
society is for the entire world to be dominated by a benevolent force.
Totalibertarianism
is Orwellian in a way. We will use the most advanced technologies and
techniques in order to detect all dissent, which will be squashed like a
bug. This means that robbers and slave traders and rapists and murders
and violent criminals will not be safe, they will be immediately
detected and imprisoned. We will have very little restriction on our
enforcement agencies, and for once in the history of mankind it will be
true when they say if you have done nothing wrong you have nothing to
worry about. We will wipe active dissidents (thieves, robbers, rapists,
etc) off the face of the earth with an unprecedented ruthlessness.
Stalin would approve...
I
doubt it, Stalin was a totalitarian not a totalibertarian. Our end goal
is completely different, even if our means of obtaining it may be
similar. Totalitarianism is actually really great and certainly the best
system, it just needs the right people with the right beliefs to be
running the show.
-
Totalitarianism
(or totalitarian rule) is a term employed by some political scientists
to describe a political system in which the state holds total authority
over the society and seeks to control all aspects of public and private
life wherever possible.[1]
Sounds
great to me! We need a force to hold total authority over society and
to control all aspects of public and private life. We need this force to
prevent people from stealing, to prevent people for robbing and raping
and murdering. Every single aspect of every individuals life should be
under strict control, either to prevent them from doing bad things or to
prevent people from doing bad things to them. See, Totalibertarians
want your life to be under complete control and they want you to have no
freedom at all to go against the principles of Totalibertarianism. But
it is actually great, because they don't want to prevent you from doing
much! Indeed, they want to let you do more and have more choices about
your life than any other political organization ever has in the history
of humanity! And yes, they want to hold total authority over society,
but it is not a bad thing! They need total authority over society to
prevent bad people from doing bad things and to prevent bad people from
telling good people what they can and cannot do.
Totalitarianism
is an extreme version of authoritarianism. Authoritarianism primarily
differs from totalitarianism in that social and economic institutions
exist that are not under governmental control. Building on the work of
Yale political scientist Juan Linz, Paul C. Sondrol of the University of
Colorado at Colorado Springs has examined the characteristics of
authoritarian and totalitarian dictators and organized them in a chart:
Sounds
great to me! There should be no social or economic institutions that
are not under the complete control of Totalibertarians. If society is
not dominated by totalibertarians, we will have situations where certain
groups, such as drug users, are sent to prisons as slaves of the state.
We will have the majority of people saying that gay people cannot get
married. We will have people robbing others with a cloak of legitimacy.
None of this is acceptable and it cannot be tolerated in the slightest,
and the only way to prevent these horrible things from happening is if
Totalibertarians are in complete control of all social and economic
institutions. Now being in complete control doesn't mean that they will
do bad things, it means that they will prevent bad things from being
done! That is the primary difference between classical totalitarianism
and Totalibertarianism. Any form of totalitarianism that is not
totalibertarianism is the epitome of evil, of intolerance and of war, so
conversely Totalibertarianism is the epitome of Good, of Tolerance and
of Peace.
Elaborate guiding ideology.
Single mass party, typically led by a dictator.
System of terror, using such instruments as violence and secret police.
Monopoly on weapons.
Monopoly on the means of communication.
Central direction and control of the economy through state planning.
Sounds
mostly fine to me! Society should be guided by the elaborate ideology
of libertarianism. Once we have made all things any reasonable person
would consider acceptable to be legal, then there are no more slaves.
There is no more worthy controversy against crimes. We must be so
tolerant that only vile criminals would think we stand for anything
other than peace and tolerance. Our system of laws must be so lax that
there is no doubt that criminals are bad people, indeed under
totalibertarianism there will be no accusations that acceptable
behaviors are criminalized and therefore any claim of oppression will be
unfounded. Indeed, people will not claim that we are oppressive but
rather that we are too tolerant! This is the contrast between classical
totalitarianism and totalibertarianism, in a classical totalitarian
society the claim is that the powers are extremely oppressive, in
Totalibertarianism they will claim that our tolerance is too great!
We
must have only Totalibertarians in power. We can have a dictator, but
it is better to have a council to prevent one of the dictators from
straying from Totalibertarianism. There can even be different political
parties that have power and their own forces, but they all need to be
Totalibertarians ideologically and all must recognize their moral
obligation to squash and power that forms and is not Totalibertarian,
and to squash any of the factions of Totalibertarianism that stray from
the ideology.
Secret police and violence are fine, and indeed
our enemies must be treated ruthlessly. Anybody who strays from
Totalibertarianism is a criminal and probably a terrorist or slave
trader at that, and they need to be dealt with violently and harshly.
Again, nobody can complain if they are doing nothing wrong, no ideology
on earth is as tolerant as Totalibertarianism. No person on earth will
say that we are violent to people who do not deserve violence, rather
they will claim that we are not violent to people who they think we
should be violent to!
A monopoly on weapons is not acceptable,
people need to be free to have weapons, although it is debatable if we
should let non totalibertarians have access to nuclear weapons and other
weapons of mass destruction. Certainly the people have a right to guns
and general weapons though.
A monopoly on the means of
communication is not acceptable, and this is one of the areas where
Totalibertarianism differs from classical totalitarianism.
Central
direction and control of the economy is a must! The totalibertarian
forces must ensure that the economy remains free from taxation, free
from oppression, etc. So although we must maintain total control of the
economy, we will use this control only to ensure that the economy
remains free.
-
We'll free you from oppression with our new, improved and better oppression...
-
We'll free you from oppression with our new, improved and better oppression...
And
how is it oppression? Are we oppressing the thieves because they cannot
steal? The slave traders because we have freed the slaves? The only
people oppressed by Totalibertarians deserve to be oppressed.
To
totalibertarians, the only dissidents are thieves, rapists, murderers,
kidnappers, robbers and similar. And yes, we will ruthlessly crush and
oppress the dissidents.
-
We'll free you from oppression with our new, improved and better oppression...
And
how is it oppression? Are we oppressing the thieves because they cannot
steal? The slave traders because we have freed the slaves? The only
people oppressed by Totalibertarians deserve to be oppressed.
To
totalibertarians, the only dissidents are thieves, rapists, murderers,
kidnappers, robbers and similar. And yes, we will ruthlessly crush and
oppress the dissidents.
It's
oppression because your system would deprive the people of free will
and choice. You may do everything, do what you want, as long as you do
not form a body where representatives of the many go to decide what the
many will do communally.
I want to be taxed. I want to pay so
institutions without commercial interest can teach my kids, foster
research that the profit-mongers don't care to do for lack of instant
financial incentive. I want emergency services that are above making a
wallet biopsy their main criterion in the decision whether to save me or
not.
Your world is the same to me as living under Stalin or
Hitler, for it will forbid me to lead the life I want to live because it
doesn't fit in its ideology.
-
It's
oppression because your system would deprive the people of free will
and choice. You may do everything, do what you want, as long as you do
not form a body where representatives of the many go to decide what the
many will do communally.
But
you are mistaken! Under the rule of Totalibertarians you are free to
form a body where representatives of the many go to decide what the many
will do communally! But it must be voluntary. Meaning you can choose to
join such an organization. But you cannot force others to join it. And
you cannot have what the many decides upon be binding onto the few who
do not choose to join the organization. For example, you can have a
community school still, and you can pay taxes to the people running it.
But you cannot force somebody who does not want to use the service to
pay for it, so you cannot tax them or require them to join your
organization. Totalibertarians are extremely tolerant of those who wish
to organize in whatever way they see fit, indeed we are accepting of
communists and of free market capitalists! However, the default position
of all people is free market capitalism, and we will protect those who
do not wish to join communist structures. So you can have your commune
and those who decide to join it can live under the rules they have
agreed upon. But those who do not wish to join cannot be forced to, and
their default status is Free Market Capitalism. They can only lose their
default status by voluntary agreement.
But you are
correct in that Totalibertarians dream of a world where we violently rip
freedom and choice away from the many. Their freedom to kill, to rob,
and to enslave will be viciously ripped from them. They will have no
choice at all in the matter! They will cry out in agony, begging us to
relinquish our total control over their lives, but we will never allow
it.
I
want to be taxed. I want to pay so institutions without commercial
interest can teach my kids, foster research that the profit-mongers
don't care to do for lack of instant financial incentive. I want
emergency services that are above making a wallet biopsy their main
criterion in the decision whether to save me or not.
Under
Totalibertarianism you are free to be taxed and free to not be taxed!
As I have already pointed out, we are extremely tolerant. If you want to
be taxed, feel free to join such an organization and be taxed by them!
However, of course you cannot force others to be taxed by this
organization, for to do so would make you an armed robber and therefore a
dissident. Totalibertarians must ruthlessly crush all dissidents to
ensure that our regime never falls out of power.
Your
world is the same to me as living under Stalin or Hitler, for it will
forbid me to lead the life I want to live because it doesn't fit in its
ideology.
But
you are wrong! You can be taxed by an organization! The organization
can have its own rules! You can even agree to be sacrificed in a volcano
by this organization, to please the God that you worship
(Totalibertarians are extremely tolerant of religion). The thing is
though, this organization cannot force its rules onto others. So you
cannot tell your neighbor that he must be taxed by this organization. If
you do so you are a dissident and must be ruthlessly crushed like a
bug. Additionally, you cannot force your neighbor to be thrown into a
volcano to please your God, as doing so would make you a dissident and
an enemy of the Worlds Totalibertarian Liberation Army.
-
I do admit that over a number of posts it does sound tempting, fascinating even...
I
just don't think it is something you could gradually move a society to,
the only way to accomplish it would be some sort of radical reset with
wealth/resource redistribution to prevent the crony-riches from simply
tilting the market into their favor again.
Plus, I am having
trouble liking a system that considers physical violence and retribution
a proper venue. But I admit, it does sound sexy.
-
The only way to accomplish it is for enough people to join the
Worlds Totalibertarian Liberation Army, and for us to amass enough
weapons to beat the armies of the world into submission.
Of
course it would be more beneficial for us to not engage in traditional
warfare. Rather, targeted assassinations and attacks without fronts
forming. The worlds political structures can be taken advantage of as
well, to gradually make our way toward Totalibertarianism. For example,
consistently kill the political leaders who are most against us, and it
becomes artificial selection. Is a certain political organization
consisting of 50% people who are 100% against freedom and 50% people who
are 90% against freedom? Kill the 50% who are most against freedom, and
hope that their replacements are more for freedom. After doing this
long enough maybe we can cause the balance to lean more and more toward
freedom, up to the point that the political organization voluntarily
embraces Totalibertarianism. There is actually no point for us to take
on armies, armies are there largely to form a front that an attacking
force needs to get past in order to target the politicians and other
powerful members of a country. But Totalibertarians are already spread
through out the world, and we can spread our ideology to others through
the internet and try to convert more members to our cause. We have no
need to try to push back a front, we have mini-fronts all over the
place, every man can be his own front.
Then we can get the
armies of nations to submit to us without even actually fighting with
them. Once we take over the political structures we effectively take
over the armies they control. Then we can use the armies to further our
cause, if required, on our path to global domination.
-
How will the WTLA deal with the distribution of agricultural land
and the mineral wealth contained within? Also all the wealth, factories
machinery and other means of production. All of these are currently
mostly in private hands. Since the default position will be free market
capitalism, the current owners will surely begin this glorious golden
dawn with something of an advantage. So I imagine they will be unwilling
to join our voluntary tax based societies.
So me and my redistributive taxation loving comrades will
be free to start our more equitable society, as long as we don't attempt
to tresspass on any of THEIR productive agricultural land or attempt to
take any of THEIR oil. There's plenty of desert going spare.
Once again Libertarianism seems to promise freedom in proportion to wealth.
-
"Let's play monopoly, its a game of skill and some chance, where the
goal is to acquire property and money.....oh, by the way, the way I
like playing it, I start with all the money and property. Other than
that its basically a free market. So presumably the most deserving will
end up owning most of the board. Oh also, we don't use the rules in the
box, how we play is the person with the most property and money makes up
the rules as they go along. And if you pull a 'super tax' card you
don't have to pay, why should men with guns extort money from you?"
-
How
will the WTLA deal with the distribution of agricultural land and the
mineral wealth contained within? Also all the wealth, factories
machinery and other means of production. All of these are currently
mostly in private hands. Since the default position will be free market
capitalism, the current owners will surely begin this glorious golden
dawn with something of an advantage. So I imagine they will be unwilling
to join our voluntary tax based societies.
Yes
I certainly imagine that they will be totally unwilling to join your
voluntary tax based society. I know I sure as hell will not. Why should I
pay for schools that I don't go to, or pay to use roads that I don't
use, or pay to fund the police that I disagree with? I would rather pay
to go to school where I want to, and pay to use the roads I want to, and
pay the police who I agree with. I am not so dumb that I cannot select
what I want to fund myself, I sure as hell don't need armed men with
guns to take my money and spend it on what they see fit.
WTLA
recognizes that many of the rich people today are only rich at the
expense of others. A prime example of this would be all drug enforcement
agents. Now of course we would immediately fire all such people, but if
they can keep their ill gotten gains is another question. I would
personally be in favor of seizing all of their assets, as all the money
they have is from kidnapping, slavery, and extortion. As far as owners
of companies and such, in many cases they rightfully have those things.
You are not born into life promised a means of production or promised a
factory or promised a big chunk of land. However, you have the right to
not be extorted by others, by your very nature of being a human! So you
will not be taxed at all, and can spend your money however you want as
well.
It is just not realistic for us to go through out all of
human history and look at the events that caused certain people to have
money today, and see if they got their money from wrong deeds, so that
we can seize it and give it to the people they wronged. We cannot say
that oh some white people are only rich today because their great great
great great grandparents owned slaves and got rich off of their labor,
so let us take their money and distribute it to the great great great
great grandchildren of slaves. Too much history in the world, too many
events, too many interpretations, etc, we cannot undo the wrongs of
history.
To me it sounds like some of you might be be less
opposed to the WTLA if we had a final single redistribution of wealth,
to try to lessen the impact of the previous wrongs in the world. Maybe
good people will have money taken from them as well, but perhaps having a
single time fee for the cost of perpetual freedom afterwards is worth
it. But the thing is, even this is not really realistic. The world has
$231,000,000,000,000 worth of private wealth in it. If we taxed
everybody a single time fee of 50% of their money, we would have
$115,500,000,000,000. There are like 8,000,000,000 people in the world.
That means if we evenly distributed half of the wealth in the world over
the entire world, everybody would get $14,437. But then take into
account the logistics of doing this, etc, it will end up being much less
than that after costs are calculated. Is getting everybody in the world
a one time payment of a few thousand dollars really worth all the work
it would take? And can we really justify taking 50% of every single
persons money and then redistributing it in such a way? On the positive
side, some of the people who are only rich because of slavery will lose
money that will benefit some people who might only be poor because of
slavery. On the other hand, we will be enslaving people who did not get
their money in a bad way in the process! So in helping to right the
wrongs of the past we are making new wrongs in the present!
So
it doesn't seem very realistic to me that we have a final massive wealth
redistribution prior to implementing Totalibertarianism. I think it is
better to recognize that in the past we allowed bad things to happen,
but in the future we do not. People will always benefit from doing bad
things in the world, especially when society lets them. But that doesn't
mean we cannot say "Okay, from now on no more evil shit is allowed. The
system is fair from now on!". Sure, some people who have power got it
in bad ways. But we can either allow bad things to keep happening to not
give them more of an advantage, or we can just stop these bad things
from happening all together and hope that over time things correct
themselves.
So
me and my redistributive taxation loving comrades will be free to start
our more equitable society, as long as we don't attempt to tresspass on
any of THEIR productive agricultural land or attempt to take any of
THEIR oil. There's plenty of desert going spare. Once again
Libertarianism seems to promise freedom in proportion to wealth.
Libertarianism promises equal freedom to every single person. Wealth promises power, but libertarianism promises freedom.
-
"Let's
play monopoly, its a game of skill and some chance, where the goal is
to acquire property and money.....oh, by the way, the way I like playing
it, I start with all the money and property. Other than that its
basically a free market. So presumably the most deserving will end up
owning most of the board. Oh also, we don't use the rules in the box,
how we play is the person with the most property and money makes up the
rules as they go along. And if you pull a 'super tax' card you don't
have to pay, why should men with guns extort money from you?"
The
thing is, we have been playing the same game of monopoly since the
start of life. You just joined the game late. Your ideology says that
every now and then we take all the money back and all the property back
and start the game all over from scratch.
-
Hello All,
I'd
be very interested to see if some of my fellow and esteemed SR friends
could convince me to take back up the banner of Libertarianism
again.
As my subject suggests, I used to be a
Libertarian. However, I slowly came to the conclusion that it just
won't work. I've now concluded that Libertariansim is a lot like
Communism, they both look pretty good on paper, but neither adequately
incorporates certain realities of human nature. In fact, they both
have the same basic failing, they assume too much uniformity in the
human condition, and are too optimistic about that condition.
In
Communism, the problem is that it assumes no one really has a desire to
have "more" than someone else. It assumes that the most capable
will be happy to get the same share as the least capable. Share
and share alike. Ridiculous. Brain surgeons want Bentleys,
not Yugos.
Libertarianism assumes everyone is ready and
willing to compete and work hard, and that everyone has something
special to bring to market, if only given the chance. Ridiculous
as well. Here's why.
The world is filled with four kind of people in my estimation:
1) Those whom cannot "do"
2) Those whom can "do" a little but are not very motivated to do so.
3) Those whom can "do" a little and are motivated to do so.
4) Those whom can "do" a lot, and are super motivated.
In
the perfect Libertarian society, those whom inhabit type 3 & 4
would represent a middle and upper class (modestly well off, and rich
respectively). The 1s and 2s would all be poor, and with no
governemnt hand-outs would live in squalor unless the 3s & 4s, out
of the kindness of their hearts supported them (which is not going to
happen, lets face it...we pity the poor...we don't actually like them).
The
problem here is that the 1s & 2s...outnumber the 3s and 4s..by
quite a large margin in my estimation. Incapable and unmotivated
though they may be...they all want to live and feel dignified...and they
can all fire a gun.
In the long term, this would lead to violence, and a displacement of the Libertarian system.
Thus
I've concluded that the best system is pretty much like the one we have
here in the US (and in many other Western contries). There is a
safety net, designed to keep the 1s & 2s safe from falling too far
into poverty...and keeping the 3s and 4s safe from angry and violent
mobs. It's more like a firewall than a safety net.
The
only question is...at what level the safety net must be placed...and
this will constantly need to be adjusted (based on the economic and
social conditions), which our republic is at least dimly able to
do over time. It also allows the 3s and 4s to accumulate some
wealth, and out of necessity forcibly extracts some of it from them for
the safety net (taxes).
It is of course, not an optimal system,
but the problem is...that people are not perfect...and thus our system
must reflect this reality.
If you think differntly, then please share where has my reasoning failed me? :-)
eternal +1
-
How
will the WTLA deal with the distribution of agricultural land and the
mineral wealth contained within? Also all the wealth, factories
machinery and other means of production. All of these are currently
mostly in private hands. Since the default position will be free market
capitalism, the current owners will surely begin this glorious golden
dawn with something of an advantage. So I imagine they will be unwilling
to join our voluntary tax based societies.
Yes
I certainly imagine that they will be totally unwilling to join your
voluntary tax based society. I know I sure as hell will not. Why should I
pay for schools that I don't go to, or pay to use roads that I don't
use, or pay to fund the police that I disagree with? I would rather pay
to go to school where I want to, and pay to use the roads I want to, and
pay the police who I agree with. I am not so dumb that I cannot select
what I want to fund myself, I sure as hell don't need armed men with
guns to take my money and spend it on what they see fit.
But
what about those who can't afford good schools, who have to drive in
the slow, cheaper lane while the rich drive past in the express lane,
and whos rights the police ignore because they haven't paid
their subscription? I particularly like the idea of paying for police I
agree with...! Will these only arrest me for crimes I agree I deserve to
be arrested for?
(Feel free to bring up drug
prohibition here as a straw man. I think everyone agrees that this is
wrong but it does not follow that private police forces should therefore
replace state funded, at least ostensiably indepoendent ones. And what
about the judiciary! Will you only be tried by a court that you pay for
and enforces only laws that you agree with?)
You are saying that I am proposing that we go back through
history and redistribute the wealth and work out who the rightful owners
are. This 'you just want to divide everything up equally' has been a
rabble rousing anti socialist argument since the 19th C. Its not true.
I'm simply pointing out that the huge inequalities of ownership and
opportunity in our present society would make any attempt to institute
libertarianism a mockery of true freedom. It would be freedom for the
rich to exploit the poor. You are right that it would be
ridiculous to try and establish what rightfully belongs to who, but
since its you who wants to tear down the current system its for you to
come up with a solution to this not me.
As far as dividing everything up equally, I actually am
willing to makr a suggestion to help you out oif this moral conundrum.
How about, just to make things a bit fairer, we take a small portion of
everyone's wealth, a little from the poor, and progressively more as you
rise up the scale of wealth. Then we use this money to fund
schools for the poor, independent judiciary and police, and some kind if
healthcare insurance for everyone. Unemployment insurance to prevent
employers using the threat of poverty to drive down wages. That kind of
thing? A bit simpler than the historical census you seem to imagine I
propose. We could call it 'redistributive taxation'.
Now, the ongoing game of monopoly. At the moment,
while property and money is somewhat unevenly distributed, and players
pass on their hand, good or bad to their children, at least we
have a person who enforces the rules. They might be amenable to bribery,
and not entirely even handed, sometimes they make bad decisions. In
theory at least we can replace them. Its not ideal but I think its
preferable too allowing the rules to be interpreted by whoever has the
money and power to enforce them. Actually monopoly is a fairly poor
analogy for modern society and I'm beginning to wish I hadn't introduced
it.
-
But what about those who can't afford good schools
Don't
you find it disturbing that your answer to all of lifes problems
essentially boils down to "let's point gunts at rich people and take
their money!" ?
People cannot afford good schools, therefore we
should steal money from rich people to fund the schools. Or should we
point guns at educated people and make them teach for free? Here is the
thing. In a libertarian society, there is indeed likely to be charity.
Also, there are so many groups out there that want to brainwash people,
that education is not going to be hard to come by. There will be not for
profit Catholic schools and similar, where they mix decent education in
many areas with dogmatic brainwashing in others. Also, in modern times,
a person is able to teach themselves via the internet, at least to a
very large extent. Centralized institutions of learning are dying a slow
and painful death, the primary reason we need them is because people
who hire for jobs like to see that people have a degree. In the future I
hope we move more toward hiring based on merit instead of degree, with
certifications and such, so self taught people are not at a
disadvantage. But that is not up to me or you to decide, it is up to the
people who hire. I can get online and talk to professors, security
experts, programming experts, etc, and have them answer my questions. I
talk to computer science professors online all the time, and I don't
spend a dime for their advice! I can download things to teach me math,
to teach me programming, to teach me history or a foreign language. On
the internet there is a massive community that trades in knowledge, with
more knowledgeable people teaching less knowledgeable people, all the
way down to the total noobs. So if someone cannot afford to go to
school, they can still become very educated if they can at least manage
to get onto the internet. Also, people can work to make money for
school! My parents were not rich when they were growing up, indeed they
were pretty poor. And they still put themselves all the way through
university, all the way to advanced degrees, all the way to making fuck
tons of money. I have several friends with parents who have similar
stories, either putting themselves through college and getting advanced
degrees, or starting their own businesses and becoming millionaires in
some cases. The people I know IRL are largely from families that
demonstrate the fact that the economic ladder can be climbed, a lot of
them went from broke to rich through hard work.
And then you
want to punish people like this! People who worked hard to be able to
move from little money to rich, you want to then take money from them
and give it to other people so that they don't need to work as hard to
do the same thing. So essentially you support slavery, because you want
the hard work of some to benefit others, when the others have done
nothing to benefit those who worked hard!
who have to drive in the slow, cheaper lane while the rich drive past in the express lane
So
instead we should what, point guns at the rich people and take their
money so the poor people can afford to drive in the express lane? Maybe
the poor people can work their way up to being able to own the damn
express lane! It will be much easier when we abolish government
regulations and laws! Think of all the business that is prevented by the
government. What if some poor person wants to start a Bitcoin exchange?
Hah, good luck doing that in USA, you would need so much money to hire
lawyers and such to make sure you don't break the law, and even then you
would probably go to prison. In a libertarian society, we don't give a
fuck if you know your customers! You don't need to keep records, you are
not going to run afoul of the law because we simply don't give a shit
what you do, so long as you are not directly hurting others against
their will. If you want to go out on the corner and sell crack, have at
it! Want to be a prostitute? Go right ahead! One of the biggest reasons
why many poor people are in perpetual poverty is because of things like
the war on drugs, all things that we will abolish in a libertarian
society. *EVERYBODY* will win in a libertarian world, the only people
who will lose are the people who are currently exploiting everybody
else! Maybe the rich have the most to gain in some ways, but trust me
the poor have a lot to gain as well. How many drug prisoners do you
think are poor people? All of them will be freed and then they can
support their families. How many murders do you think are linked to the
war on drugs? How much crime do you think is linked to the war on drugs?
In a libertarian society, the communities that have been ravished by
these things will see immediate improvements. Gang violence will drop
over night, the cartels will be bankrupt, etc. Hundreds of thousands of
people who are in prison not so much because they are drug users but
rather because they are poor drug users, will be free!
and whos rights the police ignore because they haven't paid their subscription?
This
is why we need to WTLA. Because we need to make sure that everybody has
their rights protected. Anybody who violates the rights of another is
acting against libertarianism, and therefore they are dissidents and
enemies. Remember that we are totalitarian in our approach, we are not
going to tolerate any dissidents what-so-ever. People who do not stick
to the 'party' line must be swiftly and harshly dealt with. Sure, we can
have other police agencies that people pay for protection. But at the
end of the day we need to make sure that all dissidents are crushed like
bugs. Maybe the answer is not Anarchy after all, with its decentralized
private police agencies. Maybe the answer is a single body movement, a
benevolent dictatorship. But there is no reason why only one person
should be in control. Anybody who respects rights will be acting in the
name of Totalibertarianism when they stop those who violate rights. So
when it comes to action we can be and probably indeed must be
decentralized, but when it comes to ideology we must be totally
centralized. We can have the World Totalitarian Liberation Army and the
World Totalibertarian Front, and they can have different leaders and
members, but if any of them stray from the ideology of
Totalibertarianism then they must be seen as the terrorist organization
that they will have become, and crushed. By decentralizing the power we
can prevent a single dictator from going against totalibertarianism, as
the others will crush him like a bug, but we must ensure that only
Totalibertarians are in power.
I
particularly like the idea of paying for police I agree with...! Will
these only arrest me for crimes I agree I deserve to be arrested for?
Your
police agency would likely never arrest you, but the police agency of
someone whose rights you violate would. At this point your punishment
can be decided upon by both agencies, after you are convicted by an
impartial third party organization that they both agree upon. If any of
the defense agencies goes against totalibertarianism in their actions,
then they are terrorists and need to be crushed like bugs.
(Feel
free to bring up drug prohibition here as a straw man. I think everyone
agrees that this is wrong but it does not follow that private police
forces should therefore replace state funded, at least ostensiably
indepoendent ones. And what about the judiciary! Will you only be tried
by a court that you pay for and enforces only laws that you agree with?)
If
a claim is brought against you by the defense agency of another person,
then if you defense agency agrees that it is a crime you will be tried
by a third party agency. If convicted by the third party agency, your
punishment is up to all involved parties to decide upon. If somebody who
does not have a defense agency is victimized, perhaps they can take it
up with the World Totalibertarian Liberation Army, and we will handle
their case for free.
You
are saying that I am proposing that we go back through history and
redistribute the wealth and work out who the rightful owners are. This
'you just want to divide everything up equally' has been a rabble
rousing anti socialist argument since the 19th C. Its not true. I'm
simply pointing out that the huge inequalities of ownership and
opportunity in our present society would make any attempt to institute
libertarianism a mockery of true freedom. It would be freedom for the
rich to exploit the poor. You are right that it would be
ridiculous to try and establish what rightfully belongs to who, but
since its you who wants to tear down the current system its for you to
come up with a solution to this not me.
The
rich most certainly cannot exploit the poor in a Totalibertarian
society! Doing so would make them dissidents, and they would swiftly be
crushed like bugs by the WTLA. Also, the poor mob cannot exploit the
rich (what you want to happen), because to do so would make them
dissidents, and they would be swiftly crushed like bugs by the WTLA. My
solution is this, people own what is theirs. Is it so hard of a concept?
Public property will need to be sold off and privatized, as there is no
concept of public property in Totalibertarianism. perhaps the WTLA can
seize it from the armed bandits who currently run the world and auction
it off to the highest bidder. Then we can use the funds from this to
help fund the WTLA.
As
far as dividing everything up equally, I actually am willing to makr a
suggestion to help you out oif this moral conundrum. How about, just to
make things a bit fairer, we take a small portion of everyone's wealth, a
little from the poor, and progressively more as you rise up the scale
of wealth. Then we use this money to fund schools for the poor,
independent judiciary and police, and some kind if healthcare insurance
for everyone. Unemployment insurance to prevent employers using the
threat of poverty to drive down wages. That kind of thing? A bit simpler
than the historical census you seem to imagine I propose. We could call
it 'redistributive taxation'.
No this is theft and is illegal under Totalibertarianism. Those who engage in theft must be crushed like bugs.
Now,
the ongoing game of monopoly. At the moment, while property and money
is somewhat unevenly distributed, and players pass on their hand, good
or bad to their children, at least we have a person who enforces
the rules. They might be amenable to bribery, and not entirely even
handed, sometimes they make bad decisions. In theory at least we can
replace them. Its not ideal but I think its preferable too allowing the
rules to be interpreted by whoever has the money and power to enforce
them. Actually monopoly is a fairly poor analogy for modern society and
I'm beginning to wish I hadn't introduced it.
No
the rules are interpreted and enforced by the World Totalibertarian
Liberation Army, and perhaps our friends in the World Totalibertarian
Front. Anybody can interpret and enforce the rules, so long as they are
totalibertarians and interpret them in such a way.
-
Another thing I have become convinced of is that there should be no
notion of intellectual property. Ideas and information are things that
cannot be owned, and the WTLA must enforce this as well. Not only will
this be good for poor people and business start ups, but it will be good
for all of humanity as well. It does not hurt those who create when we
abolish the concept of intellectual property, they just need to switch
to more modern models of production. For example, some say that if we
say that anyone can copy a book, that the people who produce books will
go out of business. But there are even models for these people, they can
do something like Kickstarter and say they will not write their next
book until a certain amount of money is sent to them. The model for
these people needs to turn into one of pay to produce rather than pay
for production. Because if you have a copy of a book and you own it, and
you have a blank book, it is totally unacceptable to say that you are
not allowed to make a copy of the book you own in the blank book you
own. Totalibertarians are totally for peoples right to use their
property as they see fit, and this idea just does not mesh well with
intellectual property. And it does not hurt the book writers and others,
they just need to switch to more modern models.
By abolishing
intellectual monopolies we will cause many good things to happen, and it
will hurt the unfair stranglehold that many established corporations
have on their fields. This will be good for poorer people and business
start ups, and it will not be bad for producers. The only people who
will be harmed by this are those who think they can hold a claim to
information. In Totalibertarianism, all information is indeed free, and
nobody can claim to own an idea.
-
Don't
you find it disturbing that your answer to all of lifes problems
essentially boils down to "let's point gunts at rich people and take
their money!" ?
I
say "no, I am not in the least disturbed by that" given rich societies
became that way by pointing guns at poor brown, black, Asian, and Arab
people, shooting the fuck out of them, and then stealing their land /
bananas / oil / fillings from their fucking teeth.
PS, asking
rich people to pay their share for the collective good is not stealing
their money. You read like you're almost 14 years old.
-
Don't
you find it disturbing that your answer to all of lifes problems
essentially boils down to "let's point gunts at rich people and take
their money!" ?
I
say "no, I am not in the least disturbed by that" given rich societies
became that way by pointing guns at poor brown, black, Asian, and Arab
people, shooting the fuck out of them, and then stealing their land /
bananas / oil / fillings from their fucking teeth.
PS, asking
rich people to pay their share for the collective good is not stealing
their money. You read like you're almost 14 years old.
So
you want to go through out all of history and try to settle the score?
Seems like a complicated thing to do to me. I think it is better if we
just say that we should all be free moving forward, from this point in
time.
PS: My parents never owned slaves, and certainly never
pointed guns at any poor brown, black, asian, or arab people to get
rich. You sound like you might be a little bit racist against white
people, I note that every single type of person has been exploited other
than the devil whites, who all got filthy rich exploiting the others.
Do you think that Africans used to have flight technology and live in a
super technologically advanced society, before the white people came and
robbed it all from them? I am just curious because I often find that
people who talk like you believe in revisionist history.
PS: You
are not ASKING anybody to do anything. Asking implies that you can be
turned down. So why not just be honest and say POINTING GUNS AT AND
DEMANDING. And it is not their fair share. How is it that someone owes
money to the good of the collective? That sounds absolutely absurd
doesn't it? Do you happen to be a communist?
-
Aah fuck it I'm convinced.... it was the crushing like bugs that
swung it for me. Where can I sign up for the WTLA? I don't have much to
offer but I am willing to obey orders. :-)
Totally with you on
the intellectual property thing by the way. Fifty years ago the ability
to make copies of music required a vinyl pressing factory, and record
companies were able to charge huge sums for copies of music. Now
technology has moved on and the ability to copy music etc no longer has
any monetary value. And yet these intellectual property squatters are
still trying to excerpt a stranglehold on this ability. Yes there needs
to be some way of ensuring inventors and creators have incentive to do
so, but over the years protection of intellectual property has got way
out of hand.
-
I'm not sure if kmfkewm is serious lol. If you are deemed to
be "stealing" or not toeing the party line you will be "crushed like a
bug", but apart from that you're completely free!
-
Here's an interesting question for some of our more enthusiastic Libertarians.
If
everyone in the world decided tomorrow, that Libertarianism was the way
to go and all governments were suddenly Libertarian world-wide...how
would we decide who gets what the next day?
I mean let's
face it up to this point in history most of the rich people got their
wealth through collusion with big governments right (I believe that's
one of the criticisms of the current societal arrangements right)?
Also others "stole" the land (or their families did a few generations
back) from people like Native Americans, or others. It was
litterally taken by force. Shouldn't we correct these
injustices?
Or would those robbers and theives get away with it?
In
other words, who would decide whom has the most legitimate claim to a
specific property? Who would for example get the National Parks
(can't leave this stuff in the hands of government right)?
:-)
R.
-
how would we decide who gets what the next day?
I
don't think you get it. The whole point of being free is being free
from central planning, state thuggery, and redistribution of property
through force and coercion. So no one would "decide" anything.
Shouldn't we correct these injustices?
How?
Do you want to start by giving back the descendants of tens of
thousands of black families their properties which were seized in the
south less than 100 years ago? And what about the daily injustices of
asset forfeitures in the name of the War on Drugs? Or the tens of
thousands of lives which are ruined every year by the IRS?
Or would those robbers and theives get away with it?
What
in your mind constitutes "robbers and thieves"? And what makes you
think another central planner would hold the same view? Or would enforce
the law fairly and unselectively?
In
other words, who would decide whom has the most legitimate claim to a
specific property? Who would for example get the National Parks
(can't leave this stuff in the hands of government right)?
I
think you've brought up a very good point here which I haven't
addressed up till now. I don't think that anyone here believes (me
included) that a libertarian way of life could somehow be instituted out
of the blue or done through force which is the very opposite of what
libertarianism is.
There is only one way and really only one way for libertarianism to take hold: collapse.
Let me say that again so you get me: COLLAPSE.
That
means collapse of the dollar to start. Collapse of the monopoly and
absolute power of the federal reserve and the government to force people
to use the dollar and other state-sponsored currencies. Collapse of the
ability of government to collect income tax. Collapse of the ability of
government to print unlimited amounts of debt on the backs of the
people. Collapse of the ability of government to partner up with
corporations because they're just too small to do it anymore. And
collapse of government period.
The current state of affairs is
driven by a devastating series of events which happened nearly 100 years
ago. And they all happened one after another over a short span of time:
creation of the federal reserve, creation of the income tax, creation
of the first food and drugs act, exacting heavy penalties for "treason"
against the government, and of course the prohibition of drugs and
alcohol.
A protestant religious movement seized control of policy
in America back then. They were obsessed with central planning and
making sure that "you are your brother's keeper" no matter the cost. The
masses were considered either too stupid, too weak or too poor to think
and act for themselves and therefore needed government to take care of
them. They thought that laws made men good and oversaw the largest
expansion of government ever up to that point. It didn't help that the
eugenics movement was still in full swing, racism was very high and many
forms of socialism were sweeping across the entire globe at the time.
The
government's REAL power is derived from only two of those things: the
ability to collect income tax through any means necessary and to issue
debt through the private federal reserve central bank backed by the
income tax. Nearly unlimited amounts of debt since the money supply is
grossly distorted through this process and the government can do pretty
much anything to get its money. The income tax is the basis for our
modern surveillance state and money laundering laws. The thing is that I
did say "nearly" unlimited and not just unlimited since NOTHING is
unlimited and a collapse will follow. The only question is when.
I
give it another 7 or 8 years. Definitely less than a decade. The
economy will collapse along with the dollar. The size of government will
reach a certain breaking point and will implode when it loses the
ability to collect income tax. Default will follow. Cryptocurrencies
like Bitcoin will be part of the mechanism which makes this possible.
I
know you may not want to hear it but everything is governed by cycles
and natural law and government WILL become a lot smaller after growing
to an unimaginable nightmarish size. You can't stop it. You just have to
adapt to it. Make your own decisions, think your own thoughts and help
yourself and your own family and friends instead of expecting others to
do all this for you. You have some time to think about this stuff. Just
don't say that no one warned you when it comes. Detroit is only the
beginning.
-
Yes Reason that what we have been debating , do try and keep up :-).
I have pointed out that since most of the worlds wealth and land lies
in private hands already, to institute an extreme lassiez faire
free market at this point would be free in name only, as certain players
would begin with huge insurmountable advantages
The response has been that it would be difficult to the point of
absurdity to try and restore all wealth and property to its 'rightful'
owners after analyzing the whole historical proceses that led to these
inequalities.
To which I reply well thats not
really for me to sort out is it? I am not the one proposing we abolish
all checks and safeguards painstakingly clawed back from capitalism over
the previous two centuries, and so I can hardly be expected to propose
ways we can fix the system that libertarians wish to break.
I have long pointed out that the distribution of the
worlds wealth is a difficult problem for advocates of
libertarianism. It doesn't seem right that we begin a system of
free and voluntary exchange where some of the actors possess most
of the goods to be exchanged.
Libertarians tend to have recourse to 'rising tide lifts all boats,'
type argument at this point. And anyway, they say, we are getting away
from the main point, which is 'is it fair for men with guns to take our
money to give to poor?'
But under
libertarianism what is to stop men with guns doing whatever they want,
if they are backed by sufficiently large corporations? Oh yes, the
stormtroopers of the TWLA, who appear to be unelected and answer only to
their own extreme definition of liberty.
Picture the future, where increased automation has done away with the
need for much of the work force in agriculture and manufacturing. Under
an extreme free market that vast number of no longer needed workers will
presumably be allowed to starve, in the midst of plenty. Our technology
could allow us to produce all neccessitys of life for much less labour
and yet this would only less to mass unemployment. The market is not
infallible.
-
But under libertarianism what is to stop men with
guns doing whatever they want, if they are backed by sufficiently large
corporations?
And this ISN'T the system we already have in place today??? ;D ::)
But
to answer your question: how about a small, limited government by the
people and for the people which actually enforces and respects private
property rights? And a civil court system which allows equal footing for
plaintiffs and defendants?
I guess that's too much to ask since
you imply that the majority of people who have ever made any money must
be evil psychopaths who would kill homeless men with $5 in their pockets
if there wasn't a law against it. Or that most other people would do
bad things if they weren't governed accordingly. Correct me if I'm
wrong.
Picture the future, where increased automation has done
away with the need for much of the work force in agriculture and
manufacturing. Under an extreme free market that vast number of no
longer needed workers will presumably be allowed to starve, in the midst
of plenty. Our technology could allow us to produce all neccessitys of
life for much less labour and yet this would only less to mass
unemployment.
I
know. You have a point there. Why not ban all digging machinery for
starters so that you can employ 1000 men with shovels instead of having 1
man operate that oppressive piece of machinery instead? ::)
The market is not infallible.
Freedom: it's a terrible thing.
-
or done through force which is the very opposite of what libertarianism is.
Libertarianism
is NOT pacifism! I am all for implementing libertarianism through
force. Anybody who acts against libertarianism needs to have force used
against them until they stop acting in such a way. There is nothing
immoral with forcing libertarianism on the world, that is like saying it
is immoral to force a person to not kill an innocent or immoral to
force a thief to stop stealing. It is immoral to not use force to
implement a libertarian world!
-
I
know. You have a point there. Why not ban all digging machinery for
starters so that you can employ 1000 men with shovels instead of having 1
man operate that oppressive piece of machinery instead? ::)
The
communist/socialist desire for jobs is a major contributing factor to
the war on drugs. How can we give hundreds of thousands of people with
no skills and no intelligence jobs? Hmm, well we can put the most
retarded of them in the police force and hire them as prison guards, and
we can give the slightly more intelligent of them jobs in the social
sciences as addiction therapists and such! Yay, jobs for hundreds of
thousands of people, paid for by the taxes we extort from those evil
rich people who probably got all of their money by whipping slaves in
the cotton fields anyway, and plus we have millions of people in prison
where we can make them work for next to nothing! Problem solved! Yay
Communism! Oh and we can even say we are helping these poor saps by
treating them of their horrible addictions! Hey, everybody also hates
these guys looking at CP, why not make more jobs by doing the same thing
to them! Plus we can pretend that we are actually helping children! Yay
Communism! Yay Socialism! Jobs for all the retards!
I just
cannot wait to see the next group of people that they turn into jobs for
retards! Will it be blacks? Will it be people who smoke cigarettes? You
never know in communism, even you could be made into jobs tomorrow! For
the good of the community! It actually is helping people, I know
because the television told me so! The people with jobs "treating" and
"guarding" these people have assured me that their jobs are crucial for
the well being of the community! I love the community! Yay communism!
-
But under libertarianism what is to stop men with
guns doing whatever they want, if they are backed by sufficiently large
corporations?
And this ISN'T the system we already have in place today??? ;D ::
But
to answer your question: how about a small, limited government by the
people and for the people which actually enforces and respects private
property rights? And a civil court system which allows equal footing for
plaintiffs and defendants?
I guess that's too much to ask since
you imply that the majority of people who have ever made any money must
be evil psychopaths who would kill homeless men with $5 in their pockets
if there wasn't a law against it. Or that most other people would do
bad things if they weren't governed accordingly. Correct me if I'm
wrong.
Picture the future, where increased automation has done
away with the need for much of the work force in agriculture and
manufacturing. Under an extreme free market that vast number of no
longer needed workers will presumably be allowed to starve, in the midst
of plenty. Our technology could allow us to produce all neccessitys of
life for much less labour and yet this would only less to mass
unemployment.
I
know. You have a point there. Why not ban all digging machinery for
starters so that you can employ 1000 men with shovels instead of having 1
man operate that oppressive piece of machinery instead? ::)
The market is not infallible.
Freedom: it's a terrible thing.
You're wrong. I will correct you.
You seem to be arguing against a fictional character as I said none of those things
But
to take your ludricously oversimplified shovel that does the work of a
thousand men. Perhaps it it used in growing food or building houses. So
now one man can build houses or grow food for a thousand. Wonderful
news. However the owner of the shovel will only pay wages to one man to
operate it. So although this wondrous invention has created
unimaniginabe plenty, it all belongs to the shovel owner. And why in
earth should he let people eat his food, or live in his houses for free?
So all the wonderful wealth created by this new technology remains in
the hands of the owners of the means of production, while the workers
who are now surplus to requirements must either be done away with, or
some excuse be found to imprison them. THIS is where drug prohibition
and the prison industry comes into play. The surplus workers who drift
into drug supply and consumption to fill the void left by the automation
and third world outsourcing of industry can now be declared criminal
and locked up in huge numbers.
So an alternative
viewpoint is that the Capitalist desire to reduce labour costs has left
an inconvenient excess working class which has fueled drug prohibition
as a means of disposing of these surplus workers
-
I
know. You have a point there. Why not ban all digging machinery for
starters so that you can employ 1000 men with shovels instead of having 1
man operate that oppressive piece of machinery instead? ::)
The
communist/socialist desire for jobs is a major contributing factor to
the war on drugs. How can we give hundreds oof thousands of people with
no skills and no intelligence jobs? Hmm, well we can put the most
retarded of them in the police force and hire them as prison guards, and
we can give the slightly more intelligent of them jobs in the social
sciences as addiction therapists and such! Yay, jobs for hundreds of
thousands of people, paid for by the taxes we extort from those evil
rich people who probably got all of their money by whipping slaves in
the cotton fields anyway, and plus we have millions of people in prison
where we can make them work for next to nothing! Problem solved! Yay
Communism! Oh and we can even say we are helping these poor saps by
treating them of their horrible addictions! Hey, everybody also hates
these guys looking at CP, why not make more jobs by doing the same thing
to them! Plus we can pretend that we are actually helping children! Yay
Communism! Yay Socialism! Jobs for all the retards!
I just
cannot wait to see the next group of people that they turn into jobs for
retards! Will it be blacks? Will it be people who smoke cigarettes? You
never know in communism, even you could be made into jobs tomorrow! For
the good of the community! It actually is helping people, I know
because the television told me so! The people with jobs "treating" and
"guarding" these people have assured me that their jobs are crucial for
the well being of the community! I love the community! Yay communism!
Ignoring the bizarre rant about jobs for retards and 'what next? Imprisoning smokers' arguments, let me make it clear :
I
am not in favour of jobs for jobs sake. If someone invents new
technology that allows us all to sit on our arses playing with the
internet while machines produce unimaginable plenty for all I will
welcome our new robot overlords. But under a system where the market
controls all, new technology will be concentrated in the hands of the
few, and not used to benefit all.
The market has no mechanism to deal with this.
-
Picture the future, where increased automation has done
away with the need for much of the work force in agriculture and
manufacturing. Under an extreme free market that vast number of no
longer needed workers will presumably be allowed to starve, in the midst
of plenty. Our technology could allow us to produce all neccessitys of
life for much less labour and yet this would only less to mass
unemployment. The market is not infallible.
I
think you've really hit on a soft spot here. I've been noticing
in much of the press that there is a growing number of economists that
believe we are heading to a very new, and challenging development in
human history from an economic point of view...and this is exactly the
reason. Go in to a grocery store...people check out their own
groceries...go to a gas station people pump their own gas...soon cars
will drive themselves...no more taxis or bus drivers...soon automated
systems will do a better job at managing then most mid-level managers...
We
are all becoming very redundant. How long will it be before your
skills are simply no longer needed. What will we do with all the
extra people...when machines are better than we are.
-
Yes, and its difficult to see how the market will resolve this. To
be honest libertarianism seems to be a lot of soft spots strung together
by the sturdy thread of 'why should men with guns take my money and
spend it on what they want'
Which I freely
confess IS a fairly solid argument:. This is indeed what will happen if
you disobey the state, in the end. Our modern societies reserve the use
of violence to the state and the state alone.
To
understand why this is a good thing you need to study history. Humans
have risen to their predominant position on this planet by being the
most organised ruthless violent apes ever seen. Our history is a
gigantic mound of smashed skulls and enslaved women and children.
Slowly we have brought this violence under some
limited control. Every one of is still the great great great great great
great...........great descendent of the people who were successful at
violently out competing their fellows. But we have brought our impulses
to use violence to resolve disputes under control. It is still there,
for when other means fail.
The
states monopoly on violence is part of this. With a strong central state
offering dispute resolution (begun in England by Henry II and his
concept of the Kings Peace, the birth of the common law, which judges
did not decree but discover from the customs of their predecessors) it
became less and less necessary for individualk to resort to violence to
settle disputes.
The culture of honour,
where men were socially expected to avenge any slight with violence, was
usually found in areas where no central authority existed, or was weak
or distant. A man had not only better be willing to use violence, but
demonstrably so, if he wished his rights to be respected. Once strong
central government was established in these areas, the duelling culture
would dwindle, although men from these areas may still have a much
quicker ear for a perceived insult.
And so we see that the threat of violence lurks behind every human
interaction. It is not confined to the collection if taxes.
The model of dispute resolution
libertarians often propose, where one partys defence insurance agency
negotiates with the other oarty s defence agency, will only work if both
defence agency maintain the threat of the use of force,
Negotiation is always preferable, but the men with
guns are always going to be there in the background.
Have you ever seen those you tube videos where protestors
of one feather or another are filming 'police violence' shrieking with
middle class outrage "they are using force against us!" Yes my
dread locked patchouli wearing friend. That is what the police are for.
Those who protest against the state monopoly
on violence: do you really think a free market in violence would be
better? Shall we all have to carry weapons and demonstrate our
willingness to use them for our rights to be respected (oh. Yes. That
sounds good to you doesn't it. Forgot who I was talking to for a second)
200 years ago all men wore swords
constantly. (Obviously only gentlemen. The poor folk did as they were
fucking well told, or got a quick lesson in dispute resolution). Was
this a freer society?
-
we have millions of people in prison where we can make them work for next to nothing! Problem solved! Yay Communism!
If it's Communist to imprison a racial demographic and force them to labour, then Adolf was a Communist.
-
we have millions of people in prison where we can make them work for next to nothing! Problem solved! Yay Communism!
If it's Communist to imprison a racial demographic and force them to labour, then Adolf was a Communist.
It
is communist to imprison people for the sole purpose of creating jobs,
especially when the jobs are funded by taxes. The slaves are just a nice
by product for them, just like the slaves of the USSR.
-
To
understand why this is a good thing you need to study history. Humans
have risen to their predominant position on this planet by being the
most organised ruthless violent apes ever seen. Our history is a
gigantic mound of smashed skulls and enslaved women and children.
Mostly
done by states. Two bomb attacks by the US government killed 185,000
people, including women and children. Nazi Germany killed in the
holocaust alone 17,000,000 people. What about the genocide in Bosnia,
the state killed over 100,000 people. Oh yeah what about the USSR under
Stalin they killed over 10,000,000 people. I could go on and on.
Enslaved women and children, mass murders, almost all of these events
are carried out by the state. So I think maybe you need to study history
to see why it IS NOT good for the state to have a monopoly on violence!
Your claim is so absurd as to be hilarious!
Slowly
we have brought this violence under some limited control. Every one of
is still the great great great great great great...........great
descendent of the people who were successful at violently out competing
their fellows. But we have brought our impulses to use violence to
resolve disputes under control. It is still there, for when other means
fail.
Sure,
people have a desire to use violence to solve disputes. But instead, we
should let libertarians resolve disputes, because they respect freedom
totally. So, we should have libertarians gain the ability to exert the
most violence, because they will use it in the way that is best for
humanity and in the way that the least number of innocents will be hurt.
Indeed, they will prevent innocents from being hurt by using violence
against those who are not innocent! And so you just gave a great example
of why Totalibertarians need to come into power, and why we need the
Worlds Totalibertarian Liberation Army to become the force with the most
ability to use violence in the world.
The
states monopoly on violence is part of this. With a strong central
state offering dispute resolution (begun in England by Henry II and his
concept of the Kings Peace, the birth of the common law, which judges
did not decree but discover from the customs of their predecessors) it
became less and less necessary for individualk to resort to violence to
settle disputes.
The
states monopoly on violence has led to over a hundred million deaths
just in modern times. You sound like a total fool to advocate that the
state must maintain a monopoly on violence for the good of the
community. Uhm, no, Totalibertarians must gain a monopoly on violence
for the good of the world!
The
culture of honour, where men were socially expected to avenge any
slight with violence, was usually found in areas where no central
authority existed, or was weak or distant. A man had not only better be
willing to use violence, but demonstrably so, if he wished his rights to
be respected. Once strong central government was established in these
areas, the duelling culture would dwindle, although men from these areas
may still have a much quicker ear for a perceived insult.
Totalibertarians
say people can duel if they both consent to it, and do not put others
in harms way. There is nothing wrong with two people agreeing to fight
to the death. Even the bloods and the crips can have all out gang
warfare, so long as they all consent to it and do it in such a way that
there is no risk of others being hurt.
And so we see that the threat of violence lurks behind every human interaction. It is not confined to the collection if taxes.
the
model of dispute resolution libertarians often propose, where one
partys defence insurance agency negotiates with the other oarty s
defence agency, will only work if both defence agency maintain the
threat of the use of force
Sure
sure, we NEED libertarians to have the ability to use force.
Libertarians need to be the most powerful group in the world, so that we
can keep everybody else in check to prevent them from violating the
rights of others.
Negotiation is always preferable, but the men with guns are always going to be there in the background.
Have
you ever seen those you tube videos where protestors of one feather or
another are filming 'police violence' shrieking with middle class
outrage "they are using force against us!" Yes my dread locked
patchouli wearing friend. That is what the police are for.
Sure
negotiation is preferable, but if people can not agree to do this, we
need libertarians to step in and enforce libertarianism. Police use
extreme degrees of violence against innocent people. A cop who beats
someone up and puts him in prison for using drugs, should be shot
through the head. A cop who arrests someone for using drugs should
himself be shot through the head. He is a kidnapper, an armed robber, a
terrorist. We need to exterminate people like this, or at least go to
war with them until we take them completely out of power. Even after
they are out of power we need to try all of them for war crimes, and
many will likely be hung or executed by firing squad.
Those
who protest against the state monopoly on violence: do you really think
a free market in violence would be better? Shall we all have to carry
weapons and demonstrate our willingness to use them for our rights to be
respected (oh. Yes. That sounds good to you doesn't it. Forgot who I
was talking to for a second)
There
should not be a free market in violence. There should be a
Totalibertarian dictatorship that keeps a perfect monopoly on violence.
Other agencies can act in our name, but if they stray from
Totalibertarianism then we will use violence against them as well.
200
years ago all men wore swords constantly. (Obviously only gentlemen.
The poor folk did as they were fucking well told, or got a quick lesson
in dispute resolution). Was this a freer society?
In
some ways it was freer. But I do not say we should go back to the past,
I say we should go to the future, and the future must be
Totalibertarian.
-
.
Mostly
done by states. Two bomb attacks by the US government killed 185,000
people, including women and children. Nazi Germany killed in the
holocaust alone 17,000,000 people. What about the genocide in Bosnia,
the state killed over 100,000 people. Oh yeah what about the USSR under
Stalin they killed over 10,000,000 people. I could go on and on.
Enslaved women and children, mass murders, almost all of these events
are carried out by the state. So I think maybe you need to study history
to see why it IS NOT good for the state to have a monopoly on violence!
Your claim is so absurd as to be hilarious!
If you precede this paragraph with 'during the 20th century' then yes.
The
fact that during this century humans developed unparalleled destructive
capacity, and that three centralized states organized themselves into
empires geared for war is not something inherent in having a central
government that practices redistributive taxation. As you say, that was
the past.
In two books, The Better angels
of our Nature by Steven Pinker and The World until Yesterday by Jared
Diamond both authors point out that in primitive societies with no
central authority death by violence for an individual is much more
common than in modern central state societies. And yes, this statistic
does include the unthinkable millions killed in the 20th century.
Even in the twentieth century an indiviudual was
less likely to die by violence than at any time during history. Now
clearly this is small consolation for someone incinerated in Dresden or
Hiroshima, or starved in Auschwitz or Siberia. But the state monopoly on
violence offers huge advantages for the majority who are fortunate
enough not to have lived through those uniquely horrific events,
There were obviously compelling reasons why the
free hunter gatherers of the fertile crescent gave up some of their
autonomy to live in the early settlement s based on agricultural
taxation. .
'He who gives up freedom for
security deserves neither' makes a good bumper sticker. A political
philosophy not so much. Still, you will no doubt have a big fucking gun.
That's what libertarianism boils down to. "I don't need the state....I
will have a big fucking gun!"
-
Just to add. The horrific events of the twentieth century were not
carried out by states. They were carried out by people. People are
perfectly capable of self organising into huge genocidal armies and
slaughtering each other in huge numbers of their own volition. In fact
you could argue that the huge central states grew out of the wars rather
than the other way about. Pre 20th century states were much more like
commercial empires than modern nation states, with much lower taxation.
The end of the Victorian age was in many ways a libertarian free for
all, with private companies fighting private wars over the commercially
founded colonies of Africa , South America and India. Think of the
Hudson bay company, the Dutch east India compoany, and the English east
India company. Think 'Heart of Darkness' and the Belgian Congo.
-
I will need to clarify the above post but it is late and I must go
to bed. I am not saying the 2nd world war was a spontaneous endeavour of
the people of the world, rather that the activities of untrammelled
empire capitalism in the previous century led to the huge armed
conflicts, which then necessitated the organising of states into
centralised leviathans for the effective fighting of these wars. The
wars created the states, the states did not create the wars.
-
If we just have the collective nuts to fire our guns when it mattered.
Look
at the occupy movements. If about 10,000 would have shown up
armed and actually killed some of these CEO's then that would have made a
difference. We have been brainwashed into the idea that marching
and carrying signs, or even showing up to vote will make a
difference. These billionaires and politicians use brute force
when they feel threatened, so they need to be confronted with brute
force. You think if some fuck laid off a thousand employees then
gave themselves a pay raise, then had themselves or family member
killed, that they would repeat it again? I think you would have
people behaving more responsibly, or ready to die for money that they
didn't need anyway.
Remember, our framer of our constitution,
Thomas Jefferson said that we need a revolution ever 20 years to
preserve our form of democracy, yet we haven't had another.
Those who are willing to sacrifice liberty for security deserve neither!
-
...
To understand why this is a good thing you need to study
history. Humans have risen to their predominant position on this planet
by being the most organised ruthless violent apes ever seen. Our history
is a gigantic mound of smashed skulls and enslaved women and children.
Slowly we have brought this violence under some
limited control. Every one of is still the great great great great great
great...........great descendent of the people who were successful at
violently out competing their fellows. But we have brought our impulses
to use violence to resolve disputes under control. It is still there,
for when other means fail.
The states monopoly on violence is part of this.
Hi HG,
Nice post!
However,
I'm going to differ on this small part. I tend to be a defender
of humankind's reputation on these forums lately, so I can't shirk my
responsibility here.
I would suggest that our base nature
is not violent and destructive, but instead social. I'd recommend a
book called Your Inner Ape (can't recall the author), however they were
some sort of anthropologist/primatologist. The book examines
humans two closest animal relatives, the Chimp and the Bonobo. We
share about 99% of our DNA with both of these apes. Which then
begs the question, are we closer to one somehow or the other.
The
two apes are almost indistinguishable from each other physically, and
share many social commonalities. They are both highly social, and have
complex (political) communities of interaction within the tribes they
inhabit, with strict rules for behavior. There the similarity
ends, as they organize socially very differenty.
The
chimps are highly combative and violent. They organize raids
against neighboring tribes, and brutally suppress inner tribe
law-breakers or those challenging the existing power structures.
The tribes are run by male apes, with females having a seperate but
subbordinate structure.
The Bonobos are surprisingly very
different The most ineresting is that they are matriarchical, or
put simply...the females run the show. The Bonobos essentially
have a sex based social structure, meaning that it is a complex exchange
of sexual favors. The males are kept in check by using sex to
direct their behavior. The pecking order of the females is also
controlled through female bonobos grooming each other and sowing
favor. She who has the most favor rules. This not to say
that the Bonobos are violence free, not even close...but it is far less
frequent.
I believe both of these examples provide us some keen
insights about how human beings naturally organize ourselves.
Firslty, we do that...organize ourselves and work together.
The
apes both have heirarchical power structures that allow majority rule
(through the social establishment of authority) and minority rights
(both tribes have pockets of disenfranchised, but tolerance is the norm
for these...although it's no fun for them). We do this too.
Both
have forms of wealth redistribution too, the leaders almost always
decide whom gets what...however if the leaders aren't fair...they don't
last long as the lower echelon apes eventually get together and kick
their asses. You can only govern with the consent of the
governed. Just like us.
What to me is key is that neither
of these apes ever live alone, outside the tribes. Why?
Because they die. The ape tribes evolved to help these creatures
survive. When the tribes are strong and socially healthy they do
survive.
So this tells me that our nature is to organize
into heirarchical social structures where both aggression and
sexual-social political savviness play a key role in how well we
individually fare. We naturally lean toward social organization
that allows an elite class to rule, but are allowed to do so only when
the lower classes are treated fairly.
So is our natural political structure mostly Libertarian?
I
don't think so, mostly because the lower classes must be treated fairly
and get a piece of the pie (even if they don't necessarily deserve it
in the eyes of the bakers)
R.
-
If we just have the collective nuts to fire our guns when it mattered.
Look
at the occupy movements. If about 10,000 would have shown up
armed and actually killed some of these CEO's then that would have made a
difference. We have been brainwashed into the idea that marching
and carrying signs, or even showing up to vote will make a
difference. These billionaires and politicians use brute force
when they feel threatened, so they need to be confronted with brute
force. You think if some fuck laid off a thousand employees then
gave themselves a pay raise, then had themselves or family member
killed, that they would repeat it again? I think you would have
people behaving more responsibly, or ready to die for money that they
didn't need anyway.
Remember, our framer of our constitution,
Thomas Jefferson said that we need a revolution ever 20 years to
preserve our form of democracy, yet we haven't had another.
Those who are willing to sacrifice liberty for security deserve neither!
Why don't you move to North Korea if you like communism so much.
-
Bonobos also regularly engage in pedophilia , does that mean that it is natural for humans?
-
Kmfkewn you are just acting like the chimps that Reason describes
and flinging your faeces through the bars of your cage now.
"Why don't you go and live in north Korea if you like
communism so much?" You can do better than this. I look forward to
reading your posts normally as they make me challenge my own way of
thinking and seriously consider the libertarian worldview..
Bonobo society uses sex to mediate social relationships
rather than a hierarchy of violence. Chimps have a basically harem based
system where alpha males claim majority mating rights, however their
extremely large testicles testify to 'sneaky fucker' style oppurtunist
mating by beta males, leading to in utero sperm competition as a
mechanism for selection.
Neither are
useful as direct metaphors for human society. 'Natural' is a term
that has very little relevance for modern humans. We must look elsewhere
to decide how to organise our societies. A major social function in the
two other species of chimpanzee is mutual grooming and eating of
parasites, to estasblish hierarchy and 'pecking order'. Does that mean
it is natural for the human chimpanzee to do likewise?
-
Hi HG,
Nice post!
However,
I'm going to differ on this small part. I tend to be a defender
of humankind's reputation on these forums lately, so I can't shirk my
responsibility here.
I would suggest that our base nature is not violent and destructive, but instead social.
Oh
of course, I wholeheartedly agree. Humans social behaviours so far
transcend the nearest comparisons, the eusocial Hymenoptera
(bees and wasps, whos social
behaviour is an artefact of certain peculiarities in their genetics;
namely males having only a single set of chromosomes, leading to the
most effective method of reproduction being for sisters to persuade
their mother to produce more sisters (sisters being 3/4 related,
mother/daughter the traditional 1/2) . The queen is in fact a breeding
machine for the workers, rather than they being her slaves, and the sex
ratios of hymenoptera support this striking fact)
also termites who have established similarly
hypersocial organisations for less clearly understoofd reasons and to a
lesser extent some herd/pack animals, that we constitute something
completely new and unique in nature (with the obvious caveat: on this
planet).
Our two social
innovations, speech, and later writing, have enabled a level of
social complexity that is unparalled in the history of life, and the
recent development of the internet, which might be termed a species wide
RAM and storage is taking us to new levels of decentralised social
interaction, the consequences of which are hard to overestimate.
Like Mao Tse Tsung, when asked about the
outcome of the French Revolution, apocryphally replied "its too early to
say"
Well, that's s long post
considering how little I actually say in it. Sorry. However,the standard
in this thread has slipped pretty low, so, y'know.....enjoy
-
Sure,
people have a desire to use violence to solve disputes. But instead, we
should let libertarians resolve disputes, because they respect freedom
totally. So, we should have libertarians gain the ability to exert the
most violence, because they will use it in the way that is best for
humanity and in the way that the least number of innocents will be hurt.
Indeed, they will prevent innocents from being hurt by using violence
against those who are not innocent! And so you just gave a great example
of why Totalibertarians need to come into power, and why we need the
Worlds Totalibertarian Liberation Army to become the force with the most
ability to use violence in the world.
All
you're saying is we should have an all powerful state which enforces
your personal morals, supposedly "libertarian". Who decides who
these all righteous libertarians who are to run the world are?
Those who then decide who they think has been stealing(/acquiring money
unjustly), or not being libertarian enough..?
I don't see
libertarianism to be a philosophy with a reasonable end goal, but rather
a useful movement which can push against a tide of unjust state control
and coercion.
-
Bonobos also regularly engage in pedophilia , does that mean that it is natural for humans?
Sadly
the evidence would strongly suggest that this is so, my expectation
however that if the behaviour did not confer survival benefits to the
Bonobos, then it's likely as taboo for them as it is for us, and is
likely punished.
However, your question does point out an
important consideration in my analysis, namely that just because our ape
ancestors did something, does not mean that we humans must also do it
(or condone it).
My objective was rather to explore the overall
social structure of our closest human relatives, to see what might be
most natural for us. Again we need not embrace that natural
reality, but it would likely be our tendency.
Apes also throw a lot of poop. I don't think we should do that either. :-)
-
Bonobos also regularly engage in pedophilia , does that mean that it is natural for humans?
Sadly
the evidence would strongly suggest that this is so, my expectation
however that if the behaviour did not confer survival benefits to the
Bonobos, then it's likely as taboo for them as it is for us, and is
likely punished.
However, your question does point out an
important consideration in my analysis, namely that just because our ape
ancestors did something, does not mean that we humans must also do it
(or condone it).
My objective was rather to explore the overall
social structure of our closest human relatives, to see what might be
most natural for us. Again we need not embrace that natural
reality, but it would likely be our tendency.
Apes also throw a lot of poop. I don't think we should do that either. :-)
It
is not taboo for them it is common and part of their social structure.
Since you think humans should base our society off of apes, I guess that
means you think pedophilia should be the norm.
-
I've been reading back over reasons posts to see where he suggests
we should base our societies on apes, but I can't find it. I can find a
point where he describes the different ways in which our closest
relatives organise their societies, but nowhere where he suggests we
should model ourselves on therm.
Incidentally, reason, in answer to a question you put.
:
humans are exactly equally related to chimpanzees and bonobos. The
ancestral line of chimp/bonobo split off from ours and then split into
chimps and bonobos, thus we are considered to be equally related, while
they are closer to each other than they are to us. All three of us are
more closely related to each other than gorillas (branched off earlier)
orang utans (even earlier) and gibbons and siamangs(branched off still
earlier). Thus we are rightly considered the third chimpanzee, although
we have changed a lot further in the 8million years since we parted.
Bonobos do indeed use sex for more or less
every social interaction. Men fuck men women fuck women and both fuck
children. But its like when a dog mounts another male dog, it isn't
about sex its about dominance an hierarchy. Bonobos use it in a more
nonconfrontational way to seal bonds within the group.
None of which suggests that we should adopt bonobo
behaviour, anymore than we should strip off our clothes and go live in
trees.
And nowhere did Reason suggest such an absurdity.
On the other hand, chimps engage in genocidal
warfare against other tribes. In a famous study of the Goodall chimps,
there were two roughly evenly matched tribes, one of maybe 12 one of 9,
occupying neighbouring territories. Over several years the larger group
killed members of the smaller group in ambushes, beating and tearing
isolated individuasls to death, until the smaller group was wiped out
and its breeding age females and territory absorbed into the larger
group. They then came under attack from an even larger tribe and the
warfare continued.
Chimps are crap at war
when compared with primitive men however. Throughout most of prehistory
men lived in small hunter bands, in a state of ferocious war with their
nearst neighbours. Strangers could either be traded with cautiously (if
parity of numbers in encounter) or killed on sight, just to be on safe
side......
I haven't really the time or
inclination to go through human history and explain how we developed
more and more centralised power structures, with both benefits and
disadvantages, culminating in the central state. I worry we would
be foolish to cast it down without serious thought of what we will
put in its place.
I must admit I would love to
see a large island established as an experimental libertarian society.
Perhasps if antartica becomes ice free and the coastal regions more
temperate?
-
Great information Hungry Ghost, and a +1 for sharing it. After
reading the previous criticism I felt obliged to at least read up on
this Bonobo behavior mentioned (I'd not heard of this behavior, perhaps
it was not menioned in the book I cited, or I've simply forgotten.
I'd read it some time ago).
You saved me the research, thanks!
I must say, those Bonobos are a randy lot aren't they!
You
also deftly reiterated my point, that perhaps something can be gleened
from primate behavior that could inform our approach to social
structures.
R.
-
Great
information Hungry Ghost, and a +1 for sharing it. After reading
the previous criticism I felt obliged to at least read up on this Bonobo
behavior mentioned (I'd not heard of this behavior, perhaps it was not
menioned in the book I cited, or I've simply forgotten. I'd read
it some time ago).
You saved me the research, thanks!
I must say, those Bonobos are a randy lot aren't they!
You
also deftly reiterated my point, that perhaps something can be gleened
from primate behavior that could inform our approach to social
structures.
R.
I
agree! Oh you said deftly I thought you said daftly, never mind. I
don't understand why you think humans, with our great intellects, should
base our social structures on fucking apes, lol. I think when you first
became a libertarian it was after reading the fountain head, and now
you have just read Tarzan and changed your mind. Seriously, apes fling
their shit around and have sex with infants, do you really think we
should use them as a basis of how to arrange our social structures?
There is no legitimacy at all to the claim "Apes are not organized as
libertarians, and therefore humans should not be!" , and using that as
your arguement just seems absurd.
-
I don't think you are reading our posts anymore kmfkewn,
just scanning for phrases you can grotesquely distort and use to mock
what you thought we were saying. We both at several points definitely
said that ape societies should not be taken as models for human
societies, just that it was interesting to compare the methods the other
two chimpanzees use to resolve disputes to our much more elaborate
rituals and institutions.
The third Chimpanzee has evolved so far from its cousi
ns
and advanced in so many ways that its difficult to compare us to any
other animal. We have truly developed ino something unique under the
sun.....no I cant help it, I'm going to have to play the Dane:
Hamlet:
What a piece of work is a man, how noble in reason, how
infinite in faculties, in form and moving how express and
admirable, in action how like an angel, in apprehension how like
a god! the beauty of the world, the paragon of animals—and yet,
to me, what is this quintessence of dust? Man delights not me—
nor woman neither, though by your smiling you seem to say so.
Rosencrantz:
My lord, there was no such stuff in my thoughts.
When debating, I like to engage in a process of
synthesis (makes annoying finger meshing gesture). We listen to each
others ideas and try and see if we can make some common ground. I
believe this is properly known as "a socialist circle jerk". In your
last few posts you are basically putting on a spastic voice and going
"Durr so you think we should all just hang around in trees fucking
infants and flinging shit? "While I was glad you were able to shoehorn
in your paedophilia motif this wasn't what we were saying.
The chimp and bonobo stuff was kind of a
sidebranch to the point I was trying to make about the long millennia of
human societal development. From our encounters with stone age people
when the New World was recontacted, to more recent encounters with the
natives of the Papau New Guinea highlands, (uncontacted until planes
flew overhead during WWII, discovering that what had seemed a central
massif of steep impenetrable jungle covered mountains had a central
plateau of heavily populated agricultural land isolated from the rest of
he world for tens of thousands of years,) we know that for most of that
time our ancestors lived in small tribes of hunters and simple
agriculturists, who coexisted with their neighbouring tribes in a
permanent state of either war or uneasy truce, maintained only by
careful observation of the social rituals they had developed as
alternatives to violence.
In the years
since Ur,and Surmeria, and the Incas and the Maya, who were among the
first to establish central tax collecting governments, and offer
codifications of law and courts of judgement as an alternative to
violence between disputants as a means to dispute resolution. (When
individuals settle disputes over land or property by violence it is easy
for it to escalate to include their kin and tribes and allys), our
societies have incrementaly developed into larger and more centralised
states. I make no moral judgement on this, this is just the way history
has tended.
Eventually we end up
with our modern system with well its many flaws. In the course of our
debate I have reiterated one of my main criticisms of libertarianism:
the 'how do we get there from here' problem. Since most of the land and
wealth of the world is in private hands, if we begin a completely
unregulated free market, what is to prevent the have nots and their
children from ending up working for and paying rent to that haves., and
that being so, how will this society be more free?
Your immediate response was to suggest that that was
for me to sort out, and that it would be absurd to try and restore
everything in history to its 'rightful owners' (a process i certainly
never advocated. This seems to be a favoured rhetorical technique of
libertarians: ignore the actual argument, and instead point out the
absurdity of what you IMAGINE was being proposed)
Next come the (I hope facetious) suggestion that the
transition might be accomplices by the formation oof the World Total
Libertarian Army. Something that many would be revolutionaries have
learned to there cost is that forming large bodies of armed men, and
showing them how easy it is to alter society, rarely ends well. The New
Model Army, and the Peoples Dictatorship of Marxist thought spring to
mind.
But of course, the WTLA will be
different, the only dissidents it will summarily execute will be those
who are trying to interfere with anyone elses freedom. But who will make
these judgements? Who decides whose freedom trumps whos? Obviously my
freedom not to be robbed beats your freedom to be a bandit. But what
about where my freedom to fish in a river conflicts with your freedom to
divert it to hydroelectric power?
As I say our
current system is a deeply flawed uneasy balance between Leviathan
states that since 1945 have been slowly withdrawing their many
tentacles, and the increasing power of agglomerating monopoly capitalism
Capitalism has wrought wonders and clearly become the de facto system
of the world. I have no problem with that, however the States use of
redistributive taxation alleviates some of the worse side effects of
capitalism.
During the cold war there was
to some extent a beauty contest between east sand west. The west wanted
to demonstrate the superior lifestyles enjoyed by its citizens and so
used some of the huge wealth generated bytheir superior economic system
to provide comfortable living for the lowest paid workers,
Now the threat of an alternative has been removed, the
western democracys have slowly been removing the rights and privileges
afforded their workers.
I have to finish
now as busy, but I'd like to finish with a quote from Winston Churchill,
a man I admire very much, despite disagreeing with much of his
politics:
Democracy is the worst form of government, except
for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time." (from
a House of Commons speech on Nov. 11, 1947)
-
Libertarianism is a white man's ideology. there's no way in
fucking hell you could explain that to the average black man and get him
on board. in his ears he's hearing "lets completely abandon the
people who built this country (africans) and allow the klan to run
wild. if you don't want to live in squalor, all you have to do is
beat your way to the top of the white man's world with no laws against
discrimination."
-
Libertarianism
is a white man's ideology. there's no way in fucking hell you
could explain that to the average black man and get him on board.
in his ears he's hearing "lets completely abandon the people who built
this country (africans) and allow the klan to run wild. if you
don't want to live in squalor, all you have to do is beat your way to
the top of the white man's world with no laws against discrimination."
Libertarianism
has come a long way since the time of the founding fathers. You find me
a ideology better suited to the freedom and justice of all people. Not
to mention, the "white man" is a dying race, this is the 21st century.
People of all races are marrying, and having children with multiple
backgrounds, which is in no way a bad thing. But to abandon a great
ideology such as libertarianism, because of blacks is nothing short of
foolish. Many modern day blacks are beginning to realize that
libertarianism is the answer, not the problem.
-
The only question that libertarianism is the answer to is "what
superficially appealing philosophy doesn't hold up well under any kind
of intense scrutiny"
I think libertarianism would be equally
disastrous for all poor, landless folk, not just inner city black
people. Unless you believe that capitalism, emancipated from the chains
of state regulation would generate the legendary tide that lifts all
boats. Companies would actually compete with each other to pay workers
more, and the virtuous cycle of increased wages would lead to ever
increasing wealth and technical development, and we could all afford
crime, health, fire and road insurance and utility bills, that the magic
of competition had driven to all time lows.
Then I woke up to the sound of gunfire , and put my credit card
in the slot to turn the lights on. I rang up a few security companys to
see which had the lowest call out fee (not being able to afford a
general package) and in the end got back into bed. My 12 hour shift at
the assembly line began soon and I wanted to get back to that
dream I was having about a country that had a welfare safety net and
universal healthcare and free education.
-
Libertarianism
is a white man's ideology. there's no way in fucking hell you
could explain that to the average black man and get him on board.
in his ears he's hearing "lets completely abandon the people who built
this country (africans) and allow the klan to run wild. if you
don't want to live in squalor, all you have to do is beat your way to
the top of the white man's world with no laws against discrimination."
I
thought that black people would be cool with freeing all of the drug
prisoners etc. Black people are highly negatively affected by things
libertarians want to legalize, even more so than white people. Everybody
gets something in libertarianism. The rich people get freedom from
taxation and the poor people get freedom from prosecution for victimless
crimes. Sure, there should be no laws against discrimination. If people
don't like discrimination they wont buy products from companies that
are known to discriminate, etc. The market can deal with issues like
this very well.
Black people tend to be more anarcho-socialist
than anarcho-capitalist though. They want to free the drug prisoners
still, but want to steal money from the rich. Anarcho capitalism doesn't
play favorites for any race or socioeconomic status, it blindly grants
freedom to everybody. I am sure there are some black libertarians
though, hell there are black republicans. So it isn't so much a race
issue but really more of a socioeconomic issue. Poor people largely are
not gonna want to be told they cannot steal from the rich. But it
doesn't matter, cuz totalibertarians are not going to let them steal
from the rich any more than they are going to let the rich build prison
empires filled with poor people
-
....
I think when you first became a libertarian it was after reading the
fountain head, and now you have just read Tarzan and changed your mind.
LOL...thanks Dude...that got me seriously laughing. :-)
Let
me reiterate though...I'm not saying that we should behave just like
apes, I'm saying that we inherited a lot of their social inclinations,
and that these can inform us about how we organize ourselves. Not
saying that we should fling poop, on the contrary I think that we should
refrain from that.
-
...Poor
people largely are not gonna want to be told they cannot steal from the
rich. But it doesn't matter, cuz totalibertarians are not going to let
them steal from the rich any more than they are going to let the rich
build prison empires filled with poor people
And here is the thrust of the problem.
Poor
people are not gonna want to be told they cannot steal from the rich,
because they know that most of the rich got what they have because thier
families passed down that wealth after having extracted it from the
crushed bones of enslaved or in some other way subjugated people from
the past.
If we were to turn on full libertarianism tomorrow,
very soon wealth that is already very consolidated in very few hands,
would become more consolidated. It's quite easy to win the race
when you're already 9/10 of the way to the finish line when the gun goes
off. Thereafter the very wealthy, in need of protecting
themselves and those holdings would amass armies to protect it.
After
a while they'd adopt lofty titles like King or Emperor, and they'd just
love to throw fairs all the marvelous little peasants now an
again. Unless of course they got uppity, and in that case the
Kings justice would be swift and cruel to keep those peasants in thier
place.
Seriously kmfkewm, I just don't understand how it could work otherwise.
The problem of the existing distribution of wealth would give only the very rich a real shot at prosperity.
I
truly believe that at present the best government is quite close to
what most western countries have. Capitalism, with a government
taxing it to handle things external to the market, such as providing a
safety net, estalishment of a legal system to settle disputes and
administer justice, and protecting the commons.
R.
-
I mean, I think we can all agree that prohibition is an outrage and
besides a huge waste of time and resources that actually makes the
problem its meant to solve worse.
But that doesn't mean that all laws and police enforcement of them is trampling on our freedom.
There are always going to be murderers and
rapists and people with no compunction about using violence to achieve
their aims, as all of these traits were positively selected for during
our long evolution.
The problem of how to
deal with them is a vexed one. It is very difficult to envision how to
restrain violent individuals without using violence ourselves.
That being said I had rather the authority to
administer that violence rest in as few hands as possible, ideally a
police force that is notionally independent, and funded by taxation.
As I say our current system is deeply flawed, but
at least is formed around ideas of democracy, ie if we dislike our
leaders we can replace them with another set of equally unpleasant
characters.
I would be happy to discuss
ideas related to more local self determination and government, so that
communities can decide for themselves what system they wish to live
under.
-
If we just have the collective nuts to fire our guns when it mattered.
Look
at the occupy movements. If about 10,000 would have shown up
armed and actually killed some of these CEO's then that would have made a
difference. We have been brainwashed into the idea that marching
and carrying signs, or even showing up to vote will make a
difference. These billionaires and politicians use brute force
when they feel threatened, so they need to be confronted with brute
force. You think if some fuck laid off a thousand employees then
gave themselves a pay raise, then had themselves or family member
killed, that they would repeat it again? I think you would have
people behaving more responsibly, or ready to die for money that they
didn't need anyway.
Remember, our framer of our constitution,
Thomas Jefferson said that we need a revolution ever 20 years to
preserve our form of democracy, yet we haven't had another.
Those who are willing to sacrifice liberty for security deserve neither!
Why don't you move to North Korea if you like communism so much.
You
apparently don't know the definitions of big words...you just hear them
and what people say and think Communism bad, Capitalism good. In
reality, what I said had nothing to do with any of that. Your
response sounds like something Uncle Jimbo, from South Park would
say. I don't think I can get down to your level to debate. I
am sorry for you.
-
If we just have the collective nuts to fire our guns when it mattered.
Look
at the occupy movements. If about 10,000 would have shown up
armed and actually killed some of these CEO's then that would have made a
difference. We have been brainwashed into the idea that marching
and carrying signs, or even showing up to vote will make a
difference. These billionaires and politicians use brute force
when they feel threatened, so they need to be confronted with brute
force. You think if some fuck laid off a thousand employees then
gave themselves a pay raise, then had themselves or family member
killed, that they would repeat it again? I think you would have
people behaving more responsibly, or ready to die for money that they
didn't need anyway.
Remember, our framer of our constitution,
Thomas Jefferson said that we need a revolution ever 20 years to
preserve our form of democracy, yet we haven't had another.
Those who are willing to sacrifice liberty for security deserve neither!
Why don't you move to North Korea if you like communism so much.
You
apparently don't know the definitions of big words...you just hear them
and what people say and think Communism bad, Capitalism good. In
reality, what I said had nothing to do with any of that. Your
response sounds like something Uncle Jimbo, from South Park would
say. I don't think I can get down to your level to debate. I
am sorry for you.
You
want to kill CEO's because they make lots of money and lay workers off.
Sounds like something a communist would say to me. You think the CEO is
the slave of his workers. In reality the CEO doesn't owe the workers
jack shit other than what they contractually agreed to. The owner of a
company can shut the full thing down and fire every damn last person if
he wants to, and if workers who lost jobs try to kill him because of it
they should be thrown into prison and left to rot. You are the one who
doesn't understand big words. What you said is communist as hell. You
said that if someone fires people and gives himself a pay raise out of
the money, that he should be killed. Sounds mighty close to from each
according to his ability to each according to his need. The job provider
has the ability to provide jobs, so you think he must provide them, and
the workers need jobs so you think they should be given them, since the
CEO doesn't need an extra million dollars.
-
No. I don't want any of this. In the 30's, the average CEO was paid
10 times more than an entry level employee at his company.
By 2010 that had ballooned to the average CEO making over 1000 times that of an entry level worker.
Communism is a phased in system, that I don't like.
I
am into Libertarianism, but it has been watered down by the pansies on
the left who hate violence and think carrying signed effects change.
Was
Jefferson a Commie? We need a revolution every 20 years to
preserve the freedom we had after the constitution was signed, if you
read his writings.
All I am saying is this: A few guys
shoot anyone, they go to jail, and I think they should, in most
cases. A million guys start shooting, you have the new founding
father leading them. Our founding fathers were the original
felons. I don't advocate that yet, but we should star armed to the
teeth with the same weapon as LE and Paramilitary troops.
Training and the militias are important. We will not bring this
on. A false flag by the NWO or our government will cause them to
trample liberties until it can't be taken anymore and there will be a
peaceful protest and some trigger happy punk cop or National Guardsman
will kill an innocent, maybe a girl, a baby, and then the hidden will
rise up and the police, some will join us because they down want their
children growing up in a fascist state, some will not. Many of the
Nat Guard and Fema will turn and join us because they will not want to
hurt their own people.
I guess it will be a batter between Conscience and who signs your paycheck.
EVERY
SIGNER OF THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE HAD A DEATH WARRANT SIGNED BY
KING GEORGE, THE H.N.I.C. OF OUR GOVERNMENT AT THE TIME.
But
no friend, I love you. You are wrong in your interpretation, but i
welcome it. I am glad we live in a nation that does allow us to
disagree and we don't have to worry about being "disappeared" in the
middle of the night and never heard from again just because of what we
say...
....That is just if we have a plant they don't like. Much love.
-
I thought that black people would be cool
they
are, man: James Brown, Haile Selassie, Samuel L Jackson, Lester
Freeman and Omar Little from The Wire. Those are some cool
motherfuckers. Admittedly the last two are fictional characters from a
TV show. But Miles Davis actually REBIRTHED cool and he was black. I
hope I haven't somehow missed the point of what you were trying to
say? 8)
-
I agree Chil, it's an unfortunate truth that many people just don't have it goin' on.
I
worked the polls for the Libertarian party one year, and this was the
beginning of the end for me. I was absolutely blown away by the
ignorance (willfull, or not) of the vast majority of the voters. I
desperately tried to engage people in thoughtful discussion, but was
dismayed that most people didn't know what the Bill of Rights was, nor
how many branches of government we have, nor even how many states there
were.
I don't know that for sure either. I think it was 51 or 52? But I'm a European.
They
didn't even really know why they were voting the way they did...most
just came for the free donuts. They all however voted that
day.
It was quite enlightening. It gave me a new appreciation of our system (flawed though it is).
What
you've noticed are the flaws of democracy. If the majority of people is
ignorant, government will be full of people who are either ignorant or
conmen. Or both.
I personally also do believe there should be a
safety net. But don't forget one thing: if you fully implement
libertarianism, there will be more jobs. Prostitution will be fully
legal. The freakshows will return. People could even sell themselves as
cannon fodder.
I don't think there's a perfect system anyway.
-
Why can't I just vote to go live in the woods with my friends with
unlimited weed and psychedelics with a natural well, garden, livestock
and adequate hunting territory? Fuck this world I live in.
Ohh and electricity and internet would be nice too....
cant forget the strippers either :o
-
Why
can't I just vote to go live in the woods with my friends with
unlimited weed and psychedelics with a natural well, garden, livestock
and adequate hunting territory? Fuck this world I live in.
Ohh and electricity and internet would be nice too....
cant forget the strippers either :o
I'll
go with you...but don't forget munchies....if you're gonna have weed
I'm going to need some f-ing munchies...and more strippers. :-)
-
Why
can't I just vote to go live in the woods with my friends with
unlimited weed and psychedelics with a natural well, garden, livestock
and adequate hunting territory? Fuck this world I live in.
Ohh and electricity and internet would be nice too....
cant forget the strippers either :o
I'll
go with you...but don't forget munchies....if you're gonna have weed
I'm going to need some f-ing munchies...and more strippers. :-)
Fuck always forget either the munchies or the lighter... Stoner problems
~Psychedelic
-
I think a lot of our problems in this thread could be better
solved if there were still uninhabited virgin land where you could go
and live as you please. I think a lot of this strain of political
thought comes from the history of the US The early colonists were much
impressed by the freedom promoting laws of the Haudensaunee
confederation (more popularly known as the Iroquois, Mik'maq, Abeneki,
Choctaw, and I can't remember the others) who were popularly called the
"five civilised tribes" who inhabited new england (the Dawnland) before
Europeans arrived. The Indians held the Europeans in contempt for always
defering to some remote authority such as a governor or king (I can't
find the great quote that describes this in 1491 by Charles Mann, a book
I recommend you read if you haven't already, as it will change how you
think of precolumbian America)
Later, when
most of the Indians(I use this term as widely accepted) had been wiped
out by disease and the only survivors were the nomadic and
understandably hostile horse tribes of the plains, the new Americans
grew to think of the continent as largely uninhabited and open to
settlement. This ability to 'go west' and start your own affair had an
inflationary effect on wages in the east during the pioneer days , as if
you weren't being paid well enough it was always possible to head west
and start your own farm.
I feel that this
history has had a huge effect on american political thought and the
ideas of freedom held dear there. And yet this freedom was built on the
back of (mostly accidental) genocide and slavery. History is
fascinating.
In John Locke s excellent "Two
treatises on government" (after completely demolishing the Divine Right
of kings, popular then during the Restoration of Charles II) he talks
about the nature of property, and how it is acquired by 'mixing labour
with the product of nature' so that by working land it becomes ones
property. Thus is fine while still unclaimed land remains but becomes
more problematic when all land is taken. Since this book was written in
mid 1600s it seems remarkably prescient of the concerns that would tax
future political thought.
I fondly
hope that climate change might make Greenland, and later Antarctica,
inhabitable and perhaps colonists there can experiment with new forms of
libertarian society!
-
Hungry Ghost what is your fascination with groups of people in close
geographic location being forced to behave in the same way? It is a
really weird and primitive way to see the world. Why do we need some new
land to be opened up for libertarians to all move to? Why can't we just
let people be libertarians where they already are? What is the big
difference? You guys can keep paying your taxes, and the people who want
to experiment with libertarianism can stop, and only pay for the
services that we desire. You guys can keep being arrested for drug
crimes, and we can stop and be free to use drugs. There is no magic that
happens when a critical mass of people is reached in a certain
geographic area. We don't need our own island. We just need to start
having libertarian rules and non-libertarian rules, and let people pick
which one they want to be. If you would love to keep being bothered by
the police and thrown into prison and extorted for money to fund the
very people who oppress you, feel free! But we don't want to do that, so
we shouldn't. There, now libertarians can be happy and statists can be
happy, and we don't need Antartica to become habitable to satisfy your
geographic proximity fetish.
-
Roads, other infrastructure, legal system and enforcement. It is not
possible for the two systems you describe to share territory. If a
dispute arises between a tax payer and a libertarian, to who do they
appeal to justice?I can't envision any society coping with a
large group of people deciding they will no longer be subject to
its laws, even where some of those laws are clearly wrong. Plus if
'my ' group were 'choosing to pay taxes' then we too would be
libertarians, as we would be choosing to pay for services we require. I
can't stress this enough; the system you describe is not libertarians
and tax payers coexisting, it is simple libertarianism, and kind of
inadvertently makes my point. I hadn't thought of it as a fetish as
in I can only derive sexual arousal from it, and not without, but
yes, I do believe its difficult for radically different societies to
coexist geographically.See example of Indians/Europeans above.
I get it. Drug prohibition is an outrageous
restriction of personal freedom. But using this as the well built base
of a flimsy straw man woven to include redistributive taxation and
states reserving use of force to itself is not going to scare many
crows.
I believe that laws that can
imprison me for drug use are wrong, and resent contributing to pay
for them. I believe laws that can imprison me for violently assaulting
people with knives or guns to be reasonable, if not perfect, and don't
object to funding them.
Another way to
characterise libertarianism is 'everyone pays as much/little 'tax' to
who/whatever they want. I can see this working very well for the
wealthy. The poor will presumably pay no tax at all, however, if supply
of labour exceeds demand (usual throughout history, excepting after
wars, plagues, andother culls) then wages for the poor will be
driven down to subsistence level, leaving them unable to use the
insurance based models of health care and sickness pay and justice
usually envisioned by libertarians.
The
stage will be set for the rise of a new plutocracy of the wealthy, and I
cannot see how the market will regulate this, unless sufficient poor
die to make their labour more valuable,
I feel outr current system is basically capitalism regulated by
government , and I see no reason to remove the regulation and allow
capitalism to follow its relentless logic to its merciless conclusion.
Unjust drug laws not withstanding
-
I fondly hope that climate change might
make Greenland, and later Antarctica, inhabitable and perhaps colonists
there can experiment with new forms of libertarian society!
I've
often wondered what would happen if as in some sort of sci-fi movie a
whole bunch of people (say 1000) suddently found themselves on another
Earthlike planet, but with no way home ever.
What sort of society
would naturally arise? One of the big questions, about whom gets
what land/property would be kind of moot. You have the whole damn
planet, but only a few of you. So in this situation you'd probably
value other people more than land. Let's face it youd want to
stay pretty close together as a group and cooperate in order to
survive.
People would start to sort of have specialty
trades, and some sort of means of commerce would naturally arise.
Even if everyone brought in the crops together, some people would
naturally be enterprising and make a saleable item or offer a
service.
How would it evolve?
R.
-
Capitalism and libertarianism as a part of individualism separates
humanity from each other they breed competition and hatred It is a
recessive force in action. I waiver on a daily basis whether or not to
support libertarianism. The problems I have with it are (like I said
above competition leading to no one being able to trust anyone else
because who knows your dentist might just say you have a root canal to
pay for his new car payment) Also say we enact a libertarian government
system. One where there are no wars, no laws against drugs,No borders (I
think that is a libertarian value even if it is not it is not core to
my argument), No currency regulation , a limited police force and
government and no safety net. So I am going to lay out to you many
possible ways this system could fail and its flaws: So as much as we all
love what the bitcoin does for us it makes us anonymous and we can use
it to buy drugs on the silkroad but we must acknowledge it has its
shortcomings and those same short comings will be inherent in an
unregulated government system as well.Think about why we created
regulation it was to break apart the monopoly's that were taking
advantage of the unregulated system and gather all of the wealth leaving
none for anyone else (fuck you Regan economics does not work).
The same thing will eventually happen with the bitcoin but that is a
totally different topic for another day. I see nothing wrong with no war
and no drug laws apart from the fact that some people as stated before
do need parents to stop them from smoking Heroin and with out any social
programs to educate these people who need help they may fall into the
lower category but that is just speculation. So on to the other points,
What happens when you eliminate a large portion of the taxes,eliminate
welfare and social programs and eliminate regulations so that there are
no longer minimum wage, no longer any environmental regulations so that
companies can pollute and destroy the environment as well as endanger
the lower members health all of this keeping the people at the
bottom in there place into the bottom rungs of this libertarian society.
Not to mention the lack of firefighters and police officer, roads etc.
when all of these things are privatized will the people at the bottom be
able to afford to use them?? Can we trust the companies making
them?What will happen to the lower groups with no safety net, DO you
really think all of those human beings are going to just lay down and
die. HELL NO! They are going to get up rob,murder steal, Revolt and do
whatever they can do to stay alive and prosper. It will come down to
whether the upper classes money, power and weapons can over power the
lower classes numbers and will to survive. From that point it is any
ones guess what will happen next but capitalism and libertarianism I
believe on its current course will lead us to have to redefine the
phrase "Class Warfare"
-
A though experiment: imagine a 100% agricultural society, or rather a
society in which all are involved in either the production of
agricultural products, food, cotton etc, or the tools and machinery
needed to process them.
All the agricultural
land, and the factories that process the produce are owned by a small
class. The production of the machinery of these factories is carried out
by a small technically skilled class, the work in the fields and
factories can be carried out by unskilled or semiskiled workers, or
'hands' as Dickens memorably calls them in "Hard Times". Children
would also become 'hands' but cannot be as productive as adults.
There is always a surplus of labour, because Malthus.
Under a complete libertarian society, or even one with a
small rump government protecting property rights and enforcing contracts
and preventing violence, how free are the "hands'?
-
I fondly hope that climate change might
make Greenland, and later Antarctica, inhabitable and perhaps colonists
there can experiment with new forms of libertarian society!
I've
often wondered what would happen if as in some sort of sci-fi movie a
whole bunch of people (say 1000) suddently found themselves on another
Earthlike planet, but with no way home ever.
What sort of society
would naturally arise? One of the big questions, about whom gets
what land/property would be kind of moot. You have the whole damn
planet, but only a few of you. So in this situation you'd probably
value other people more than land. Let's face it youd want to
stay pretty close together as a group and cooperate in order to
survive.
People would start to sort of have specialty
trades, and some sort of means of commerce would naturally arise.
Even if everyone brought in the crops together, some people would
naturally be enterprising and make a saleable item or offer a
service.
How would it evolve?
R.
In
Terry Pratchett and Stephen Baxters collaborative book 'the Long Earth'
someone invents a simple electronic device that enables one to jump to
parallel Earths, one Earth at a time. The close earths are very similar
and quickly fill with colonists. (Some of whom 'jump' to California and
start digging for gold; before realising a rather large deflation has
just occurred in the golkd market!) The effects on humanity freed from
land pressure are interstingkyb described
The
pioneers head to the 'High Megas' (1000,000 jumps or more away) and find
a 'gap' where presumably the Earth has been destroyed by a collision,
Its an interesting read, although seems to end
inconclusively, maybe I missed something, need to read again. It was
base on a short story by Pratchett called "The High Meggas" which I
preferred. The short story is SFs perfection for me.
-
Favourite fact from 1491 by Charles Mann: 'Squanto' the friendly
English speaking Indian who helped the pilgrims, as I'm sure many US
readers will have been taught at school, had been kidnapped by English
sailors and sold as a slave in Spain over a decade ago. Having first
escaped from Spain to England, from thence working his passage to Maine
(1000s of miles of hostile tribes from his Massachusetts home) he
eventually persuaded a captain to retutprn him to his home. Only to find
the once densely populated coast a graveyard caused by smallpox, with
the pilgrims settlement built on the ruins of his village.
He chose the name Tisquantum which in his
native tongue meant something like "the rage of the world spirit" or
"The wrath of God". Whatever his intentions in introducing himself to
the Pilgrims in such a manner, he obviously had ulterior motives
(wanting to use the newcomers to facilitate the recovery of the remnants
of his tribe to power)
I love imagining
this tine in history. I like to think I would have been straight across
the Atlantic although clearly my ancestors didn't feel the same way!
-
Favourite
fact from 1491 by Charles Mann: 'Squanto' the friendly English speaking
Indian who helped the pilgrims, as I'm sure many US readers will have
been taught at school, had been kidnapped by English sailors and sold as
a slave in Spain over a decade ago. Having first escaped from Spain to
England, from thence working his passage to Maine (1000s of miles of
hostile tribes from his Massachusetts home) he eventually persuaded a
captain to retutprn him to his home. Only to find the once densely
populated coast a graveyard caused by smallpox, with the pilgrims
settlement built on the ruins of his village.
He chose the name Tisquantum which in his native tongue
meant something like "the rage of the world spirit" or "The wrath of
God". Whatever his intentions in introducing himself to the Pilgrims in
such a manner, he obviously had ulterior motives (wanting to use the
newcomers to facilitate the recovery of the remnants of his tribe to
power)
I love imagining this tine in
history. I like to think I would have been straight across the Atlantic
although clearly my ancestors didn't feel the same way!
It
is remarkable that the fairy tale version fed to Americans for
generations endured so long. A testiment to willful
ignorance.
R.
-
Favourite
fact from 1491 by Charles Mann: 'Squanto' the friendly English speaking
Indian who helped the pilgrims, as I'm sure many US readers will have
been taught at school, had been kidnapped by English sailors and sold as
a slave in Spain over a decade ago. Having first escaped from Spain to
England, from thence working his passage to Maine (1000s of miles of
hostile tribes from his Massachusetts home) he eventually persuaded a
captain to retutprn him to his home. Only to find the once densely
populated coast a graveyard caused by smallpox, with the pilgrims
settlement built on the ruins of his village.
He chose the name Tisquantum which in his native tongue
meant something like "the rage of the world spirit" or "The wrath of
God". Whatever his intentions in introducing himself to the Pilgrims in
such a manner, he obviously had ulterior motives (wanting to use the
newcomers to facilitate the recovery of the remnants of his tribe to
power)
I love imagining this tine in
history. I like to think I would have been straight across the Atlantic
although clearly my ancestors didn't feel the same way!
It
is remarkable that the fairy tale version fed to Americans for
generations endured so long. A testiment to willful
ignorance.
R.
+1 to both of you I could not agree more
-
Roads,
other infrastructure, legal system and enforcement. It is not possible
for the two systems you describe to share territory. If a dispute arises
between a tax payer and a libertarian, to who do they appeal to
justice?
The
tax payer can appeal to the police, and if the libertarian defense
agency disagrees with what happens (because the person appealed to the
police to arrest a person for using drugs, without harming anybody),
then it can be dealt with in various ways, up to and including the
libertarian defense agency bombing the police station.
As far as roads go, feel free to force the libertarians to pay for the roads that they use.
I
can't envision any society coping with a large group of
people deciding they will no longer be subject to its laws, even where
some of those laws are clearly wrong.
The
great thing about libertarianism is that most of the laws they don't
want to follow are laws that have absolutely no affect on a single other
person. Not many people are going to care if libertarians use drugs,
most of them will never even know it is happening! The main difference
is that the police cannot arrest the libertarians for using drugs. The
crimes libertarians engage in are all victimless crimes, they are only
prosecuted because the police hunt them down, as there is not a victim
involved to call the police. Of course, there are many snitches who give
intelligence to the police, but they act as an extension of the police
and are not victims of libertarians.
PS: Silk Road is a large
group of people deciding they will no longer be subject to the laws of
society. Silk Road is a private defense agency. Look who is winning so
far? Are the police and politicians throwing a fit trying to shut SR
down? Is SR down? Libertarians are already saying fuck the state, and
the private defense agencies that are willing to protect us for a fee
are already starting to emerge. In the future the defense agencies will
be even more powerful. Hell, look at all the money SR has made, many
millions of dollars. If they invested that in running a market for the
assassinations of political officials who are for the war on drugs, we
would have an entire army of independent soldiers willing to take our
fight for freedom to the level of offensive instead of defensive. I
don't think SR has any plans to do this, but in the future there will be
offensive defense agencies as well. Defensive defense agencies are
willing to use security etc, to protect their customers, for a fee, but
if the customers are arrested there is nothing they can do to help them.
An offensive defense agency would be willing to do the same things as a
defensive one perhaps, but once the customer is arrested the police who
arrested them would end up with their brains blown out as well. And the
offensive defense agencies are going to be just as effective at telling
the state to fuck off as the defensive ones have already proven
themselves to be. Make no mistake, the libertarian revolution is already
here and the private defense agencies have already risen up to the
state and have thus far defeated them without even the need for
violence. But to fully defeat them it will likely require violent
agencies as well, protecting innocent people from a ruthless attacker is
great, but at some point the attacker will hurt one of the innocent
people, and the market still demands an agency that will bring justice
to the attacker in such cases.
Plus
if 'my ' group were 'choosing to pay taxes' then we too would be
libertarians, as we would be choosing to pay for services we require. I
can't stress this enough; the system you describe is not libertarians
and tax payers coexisting, it is simple libertarianism, and kind of
inadvertently makes my point.
Sure,
you can choose to pay taxes and still be a libertarian. But the current
system is not libertarianism, because people who do not want to pay
taxes are being forced to. So the system we have now is not libertarians
and statists existing together, it is statists forcing everybody to toe
the party line.
I
get it. Drug prohibition is an outrageous restriction of personal
freedom. But using this as the well built base of a flimsy straw man
woven to include redistributive taxation and states reserving use of
force to itself is not going to scare many crows.
It
is far from only drug prohibition. Taxation is outrageous restriction
of personal freedom as well. So are laws against people viewing CP. So
are laws regarding the regulation of products and medicines. Essentially
every single thing the government does is a full on assault against
personal freedom. And the government does a lot of things, and it tries
to do many more things. Government is a cancer, it will grow and grow up
to the point it has killed the host.
I
believe that laws that can imprison me for drug use are wrong,
and resent contributing to pay for them. I believe laws that can
imprison me for violently assaulting people with knives or guns to be
reasonable, if not perfect, and don't object to funding them.
Wouldn't
it be great if you could pay to prevent people from violently attacking
others without paying for the drug laws to be enforced? The biggest
trick the government has mind fucked you with is the notion that you
need to pay for both. Nothing prevents a society where people pay for
what they want and don't pay for what they don't want, it is called
fucking libertarianism.
Another
way to characterise libertarianism is 'everyone pays as much/little
'tax' to who/whatever they want. I can see this working very well for
the wealthy. The poor will presumably pay no tax at all, however, if
supply of labour exceeds demand (usual throughout history, excepting
after wars, plagues, andother culls) then wages for the poor will
be driven down to subsistence level, leaving them unable to use the
insurance based models of health care and sickness pay and justice
usually envisioned by libertarians.
Nothing
stops poor people from forming unions or from pooling their money for
insurance. First of all, you are wrong. Second of all, even if you were
right, it wouldn't fucking matter, the rich are not the slaves of the
poor anymore than the poor are the slaves of the rich.
The
stage will be set for the rise of a new plutocracy of the wealthy, and I
cannot see how the market will regulate this, unless sufficient poor
die to make their labour more valuable, I feel outr current system is
basically capitalism regulated by government , and I see no reason to
remove the regulation and allow capitalism to follow its relentless
logic to its merciless conclusion. Unjust drug laws not withstanding
How
about the poor people join unions and demand certain wages? Why don't
the poor people pool their money to be able to buy group insurance and
such? By the way, I wonder if poor people would rather live as poor
slaves in prison or be free and poor? Because the current system right
now has enslaved the poor more than any libertarian system will. You
think there is not a plutocracy right now? Rich people run the world.
The difference is that in a libertarian society, even though they still
run the world, they cannot enslave others.
-
up to and including the libertarian defense agency bombing the police station
OK.,,,,,
An
offensive defense agency would be willing to do the same things as a
defensive one perhaps, but once the customer is arrested the police who
arrested them would end up with their brains blown out as well
OK......
. If they invested that in running a market for the assassinations of political officials who are for the war on drugs,
OK....
. So the system we have now is not libertarians and statists existing together,
Hungry
Ghost what is your fascination with groups of people in close
geographic location being forced to behave in the same way? It is a
really weird and primitive way to see the world. Why do we need some new
land to be opened up for libertarians to all move to?
because by the sound of it the alternative is civil war. I know, I know, it always seems like a good idea beforehand.
-
How about the poor people join unions and demand certain wages?
Nothing stops poor people from forming unions
what
about armed thugs with sticks hired by the owners. See history of
unions. in UK, although unions were initially suppressed and outlawed,
they gained a foothold and the protection of the law much earlier than
in US. This is why low paid workers enjoy better conditions here (6
weeks paid holiday, statutory sick pay, state pension oh yes and free
health care. )
This was only possible
because suffrage was extended to all men and they were able to exert
pressure in government. if the conflict had been solely between workers
and employers then employers would have sacked/shot all union
leaders and replaced recaltricant workers from the numerous starving
unemployed.
Why don't the poor people pool their money to be able to buy group insurance and such
they
will, to the extent they have anything left from the subsistence wages
that #workers>#jobs has caused. Of ourse, freed from the tyranny of
government, economic growth may have occurred to such an extent that
jobs>workers, in which case competition for workers will cause pay
and benefits to rise. I'm not saying this definitely won't happen.
Particularly if the civil war which the inception of libertarianism
involved has culled enough working men.
laws regarding the regulation of products and medicines.....outrageous restriction of personal freedom
So
freedom should include the freedom to sell potentially toxic untested
snake oil to desperate dying people, and caveat emptor. The market will
weed out ineffective medicines, and the people stupid enough to buy
them?
First of all, you are wrong. Second of all, even if you were right, it wouldn't fucking matter
I rarely find this a convincing argument.
By the way, I wonder if poor people would rather live as poor slaves in prison or be free and poor?
are these the only options? :-(
it is called fucking libertarianism
yes, that's what I call it too!
-
Most libertarians aren't anarcho-capitalists. There are a few things
that are more efficiently done collectively. National defence. Epidemic
control. Enforcing contracts. Prosecuting those who remove the rights
of others.
And that's pretty much it.
OP: you are living
in the present where the welfare state seems like the only solution to
deal with all the needy in our rich society. Newsflash - the welfare
state created the needy, and our society is rich in spite of the welfare
state, not because of it.
At this point, we've had half a
century of knowing that if you want to be a lazy bastard, the
government's still going to give you money. Surprise surprise, there are
an ever increasing number of lazy bastards.
However, if being a lazy bastard meant you went hungry and homeless, there'd be a lot less lazy bastards.
OP, the system we have now CREATED the dilemma that's made you turn away from libertarianism. Snap out of it.
-
Newsflash - the welfare state created the needy
srsly
-
I can only speak for the welfare state in my country, but the idea
of a sizable welfare dependent class is a)largely mythical and b) where
real due to whole areas of the country that used to employ huge numbers
of workers in mining and heavy industry having been shorn of these
sources of employment in a generation or so. This happened as a
consequence of, well, many things. Like most historical processes its
difficult to identify a single cause. The relaxation of import export
tariffs and in general globalisation has meant that much of this
industry now takes place in countries where labour costs are lower. So,
when we no longer needed them, should these people have been sterilised
and starved? Or should we have used some of our countries wealth to
support its citizens?
Again, its
complicated. As a nation we are still very wealthy, and much of our
wealth now is generated by the esoteric activities of The City (London's
financial market).
The current government is
attempting to portray the large national debt as due to 'welfare
scroungers' when in fact the vast majority was acquired when we
underwrote the huge debts that these financial institutions had
mistakenly thought were good investments. The government printed money
and gave it to banks to avert a national crisis. How is this different
from making welfare payments to those who society has failed to provide
gainful employment?
This 'welfare
scrounger' mythos is propaganda designed to promote the removal of
safeguards against exploitation that our forefathers fought hard to
gain.
These storys of estates where three
generations have not worked may be partially true. Do you really
believe that this is because they are lazy? Or has our society failed in
some way? And is this failure due to too much government, or due to the
government failing in its duty of care. If we were to abandon all forms
of welfare protection, what would happen? Would the market provide work
for these idle hands? I guess that is what we are discussing in this
thread.
But NEWSFLASH: like most things,
its a bit more complicated than 'the welfare state created the needy'.
Were there no needy before the welfare state? Was there much less
poverty before the safety net of guaranteed subsistence increased wages
to above subsistence levels.? And in the heady early days of the
industrial revolution how were workers treated, before capitalism was
moderated by a paternal state?
-
"I can only speak for the welfare state in my country, but the idea
of a sizable welfare dependent class is a)largely mythical "
Really? Interesting claim.
"and
b) where real due to whole areas of the country that used to employ
huge numbers of workers in mining and heavy industry having been shorn
of these sources of employment in a generation or so. This happened as a
consequence of, well, many things. Like most historical processes its
difficult to identify a single cause. The relaxation of import export
tariffs and in general globalisation has meant that much of this
industry now takes place in countries where labour costs are lower. "
Those
industries were unsustainable. Protecting industries and maintaining
tariff walls makes your country poorer, not richer. While the there are
certainly some losers when protectionist policies are abandoned (those
who worked for the protected industries), there are many more winners
(those who benefit from cheaper, higher quality goods - everyone, that
is). And then there's the fact that capital is freed up to be applied in
sectors of the economy where there is a competitive advantage, as
opposed to the government propping up loss-making dinosaurs at the
taxpayer's expense. And as for the government-owned industries - the
government shouldn't be in the business of running businesses. They
generally do it really badly. Thatcher was dead right to shut them
down/sell them off.
"So, when we no longer needed them, should
these people have been sterilised and starved? Or should we have used
some of our countries wealth to support its citizens?"
You mean
take money off one group of people and give it to another? I assert that
citizens should take care of their own affairs. That is the natural
order of things.
"As a nation we are still very wealthy, and much
of our wealth now is generated by the esoteric activities of The City
(London's financial market)."
Yes and your whole country is bankrolled by that 'esoteric' activity.
"The
current government is attempting to portray the large national debt as
due to 'welfare scroungers' when in fact the vast majority was acquired
when we underwrote the huge debts that these financial institutions had
mistakenly thought were good investments. "
Um no, that's quite
wrong. You were running large budget deficits throughout much of the
Blair/Brown era. That's where your debt came from. Your bank bailouts
were relatively modest, particularly in comparison to those of some
other countries (ie. Ireland, Iceland)
"The government printed
money and gave it to banks to avert a national crisis. How is this
different from making welfare payments to those who society has failed
to provide gainful employment?"
I don't agree with printing
money, but that's a different issue from wealth redistribution. Why is
it society's job to provide employment for people? Seriously, you're
using the language of the far left.
" This 'welfare scrounger'
mythos is propaganda designed to promote the removal of safeguards
against exploitation that our forefathers fought hard to gain."
It's
hardly a myth. You seriously don't think there are problems with
generational welfare dependency in the UK? Damn. Every developed country
has this problem. And what exploitation are you talking about?
"These
storys of estates where three generations have not worked may be
partially true. Do you really believe that this is because they are
lazy? Or has our society failed in some way?
Partially true? How
could that be? The ever-growing client class isn't lazy as such - it's
just that there is no incentive to work if the government provides
everything for you. The state has failed by creating this client class
in the first place. And those who had a hand in putting this
cradle-to-grave welfare system in place failed, too.
"If we were to abandon all forms of welfare protection, what would happen? "
People
would do what they did before the welfare state. They would work, and
rely on family and private networks in difficult times.
"Would the market provide work for these idle hands? "
Sure,
of course it would. It did before. There was life before the welfare
state. I'm not suggesting we abolish the welfare state overnight, as
that would cause chaos. People have made long term plans based on the
assumption that they will receive government benefits at certain point
in their lives. A gradual phase-out would be the best way.
Unfortunately, this would appear to be politically impossible (people
love them some "free stuff" from the government - manna from heaven or
something). That doesn't change the fact that the current, ever-growing
welfare state is unsustainable and it eventually will collapse, meaning
that a bunch of people will overnight be thrown off their benefits and
that will be catastrophic. Far better to have a slow phase-out so that
civil society can gradually resume the functions that the state has
monopolised over the past 60 years or so. It won't happen, though.
Collapse is far more likely.
But
NEWSFLASH: like most things, its a bit more complicated than 'the
welfare state created the needy'. Were there no needy before the welfare
state? Was there much less poverty before the safety net of guaranteed
subsistence increased wages to above subsistence levels.?"
Newsflash,
no it isn't. The welfare client class is hardly well-off. They'd be
better off working, but there is little incentive for them to work. The
genuinely needy in wealthy societies are almost always needy due to
decisions that they, as adults, need to take responsibility for. I will
reiterate the point is that the reason there is less poverty today is
because society is wealthier, and that wealth has been created by
private enterprise IN SPITE OF government intervention, not because of
it.
"And in the heady early days of the industrial revolution
how were workers treated, before capitalism was moderated by a paternal
state?"
They were heady days, indeed. Workers during the
industrial revolution period were treated much better than
pre-industrial revolution workers. The industrial revolution saw
enormous and rapid rises in living standards across all levels of
society. Moderating capitalism has merely made it less effective at
generating wealth. Like I said, our society today is wealthier than
before IN SPITE OF state intervention, and would be wealthier if there
was little intervention. Free markets are enormously powerful wealth
generators and are powerful enough to carry an epic bureaucratic burden,
but eventually they will sink under the burden. And in a society where
so many people have an expectation that the state will provide for them
and care little about the cost because "the government pays for it",
that burden will be ever increasing.
-
I
can only speak for the welfare state in my country, but the idea of a
sizable welfare dependent class is a)largely mythical and b) where real
due to whole areas of the country that used to employ huge numbers of
workers in mining and heavy industry having been shorn of these sources
of employment in a generation or so. This happened as a consequence of,
well, many things. Like most historical processes its difficult to
identify a single cause. The relaxation of import export tariffs and in
general globalisation has meant that much of this industry now takes
place in countries where labour costs are lower. So, when we no longer
needed them, should these people have been sterilised and starved? Or
should we have used some of our countries wealth to support its
citizens?
Think
about what you're saying here. Let's say the government did exactly as
you wanted and dramatically raised trade tariffs (which would be
completely against the common market over the past 60+ years and the EU
over the past 20). Do you think that more companies or less companies
would set up shop in Britain? Serious question. More or fewer companies?
And your reasons for thinking this.
Again, its complicated. As a nation we are still
very wealthy, and much of our wealth now is generated by the esoteric
activities of The City (London's financial market).
The current government is attempting to portray the large
national debt as due to 'welfare scroungers' when in fact the vast
majority was acquired when we underwrote the huge debts that these
financial institutions had mistakenly thought were good investments. The
government printed money and gave it to banks to avert a national
crisis. How is this different from making welfare payments to those who
society has failed to provide gainful employment?
I'm
impressed! I guess you stumble upon the truth occasionally. You're
right. It is no different. It is redistribution personified.
Redistribution is redistribution. Period. This philosophy is backed by
theft (taxation and inflation). And debt. Lots and lots of debt. The
government grows and snuffs out whatever it doesn't like (like
investigative reporters, whistleblowers and small businesses). The poor
are occasionally thrown a few bones while the bankers feast. Welfare is
great because it keeps so many people dependent upon government. Keeps
the crooked wheels and palms of the state greased. Warfare is great
because it does the same. More government. More theft. More taxes. More
debt.
Remember that a government that's big enough to give you
everything you want is a government that's also big enough to take away
everything you have. The same government that makes it seem like it was
behind poverty reduction will turn around and loot the poor and middle
class to line the pockets of government's best patrons. The mega rich.
This ruse worked perfectly with the coalition. Weak dog Nick Clegg is
the poster boy of a statist and someone who supports redistribution all
the way. He was against it before he supported it lol
Would the market provide work for these idle hands?
Only
if a market wage were permitted to exist and trade/creation/production
were not regulated by the government. Jobs would start flowing in again
like gangbusters.
But NEWSFLASH: like most things, its a bit more
complicated than 'the welfare state created the needy'. Were there no
needy before the welfare state? Was there much less poverty before the
safety net of guaranteed subsistence increased wages to above
subsistence levels.? And in the heady early days of the industrial
revolution how were workers treated, before capitalism was moderated by a
paternal state?
Minimum
wage was invented to try and cushion people against the ravages of
inflation (and also taxation to a lesser degree). Again both are forms
of theft. At one point 1 pound would actually buy you 1 real pound of
99% sterling silver. How much will it buy you today? ;)
-
Let's say the government did exactly as you wanted and dramatically raised trade tariffs
did
not suggest this, but just that a painful process of readjustment
took place during this time, and the welfare state helped cushion
the blow
"I can only speak for the welfare state in my country, but the idea of a sizable welfare dependent class is a)largely mythical "
Really? Interesting claim.
yeah,
I fucked up there, welfare has created problems of dependency, I
meant to dispute the 'welfare scroungers' myth
Why is it society's job to provide employment for people? Seriously, you're using the language of the far left.
only
among far right libertarian circles popular on this site is the
idea that society has some duty of care for its citizens
considered as far left. I would characterize it as a fairly middle
of the road, Keynesian idea which was followed with some success by
most western democracies throughout 50s and 60d. There are flaws in
Keynesian ideas, just as there are flaws in the neoliberal consensus
that has replaced it.
. That is the natural order of things.
the natural order of things is the strong dominate and exploit
the weak. The welfare state defends against this slightly.
Anyway, you make some interesting arguments that
I'll return to. I'm not some kind of communist, and much of what you say
is true. I have to go to work now though.
-
The fact that you would use a label like "far right libertarianism"
clearly demonstrates you don't understand what libertarianism is.
-
metacontxt, are you aware of the extreme poverty and squalid living
conditions which were widespread in slums around the UK during the
'heady days' of the industrial revolution? I'm largely ignorant of
conditions in the US at this time, so it maybe wasn't so much of an
issue there. The market did little to help these people, who were
certainly not lazy.
I do agree with a lot of your concerns tbh,
welfare dependency is an issue. It's just a kind of balancing act
between allowing financial freedom and preventing unacceptable levels of
poverty reappearing...
-
"metacontxt, are you aware of the extreme poverty and squalid living
conditions which were widespread in slums around the UK during the
'heady days' of the industrial revolution?"
Of course. Their living standards were far better than the poor of pre-Industrial Revolution Britain.
"I'm largely ignorant of conditions in the US at this time, so it maybe wasn't so much of an issue there. "
I'm
not sure why this is germane to the discussion, but I'll just add this
little rider - living standards in the US improved remarkably quickly
when the federal government was of trivial importance to the lives of
citizens.
"The market did little to help these people"
In
fact, the free market did everything to help those people. The free
market was EXACTLY why the 19th century poor were better off than the
poor of the 18th century. To suggest otherwise is Dickensian ahistorical
nonsense that socialists/greens tend to subscribe to; ie. the
Industrial Revolution came along and packed the peasants off to work in
"dark, satanic mills" and endure a life of extreme poverty, as opposed
to the happy, bucolic existence they enjoyed prior to the dawn of the
industrial age.
Throughout history, when free markets flourished,
prosperity increased. When constraints were placed on free markets,
rates of poverty increased. There are no exceptions to this rule.
"who were certainly not lazy."
Strawman.
No one was saying they were. They couldn't be. They would had led
utterly miserable lives if they were. And that's exactly how it should
be. No one owes you a living.
-
The
fact that you would use a label like "far right libertarianism" clearly
demonstrates you don't understand what libertarianism is.
Not saying the two are synonymous, you know lots of terms
such as left right communist capitalist free market etc. are bandied
about without clear definition in these debates.(Which by the way i try
to keep civil by not telling other contrributors they don't even know
what the subject of the debate is. )But economically there is a overlap
between conservative right wing fiscal policys and libertarian
economic ideas, specifically in this case pertaining to welfare state.
One of my problems with libertarianism is that it
appears to be somewhat amorphous, and there is no clear consensus on
what it involves. Advocates seem able to adopt and drop various
functions of the state as it suits their current position. Clearly in
its purest form it would involve no government at all, however
libertarians still pepper their speech with references to laws,
contracts and other things which are difficult to imagine operating
without some form of government. This makes debating them problematic as
there is no one position being defended.
Also you seem to have read a somewhat different history of industrialisation than I have.
-
But economically there is a overlap between
conservative right wing fiscal policys and libertarian economic ideas,
specifically in this case pertaining to welfare state.
You
mean Reaganomics (national debt nearly tripled over two terms)? Or when
Dick Cheney said "deficits don't matter" (national debt nearly doubled
over Dubya's two terms)? Yeah. Clearly some overlap there with
libertarian economic ideas lol :o ::)
One of my problems with libertarianism is that it
appears to be somewhat amorphous, and there is no clear consensus on
what it involves. Advocates seem able to adopt and drop various
functions of the state as it suits their current position. Clearly in
its purest form it would involve no government at all, however
libertarians still pepper their speech with references to laws,
contracts and other things which are difficult to imagine operating
without some form of government. This makes debating them problematic as
there is no one position being defended.
That's
because like meta said you have no idea what libertarianism is. Don't
worry. Not many people do. They often confuse it with either fascism or
some forms of conservatism or even anarchy as you did here with your
"difficult to imagine operating without some form of government"
statement. So you are the one who is amorphous in your understanding of
libertarianism. It's not the fault of the philosophy that you don't
understand it. Your criticisms sound identical to those in the
mainstream media when the Occupy movement was going on. The only
difference is yours don't have any merit whatsoever. No offense.
Please
read "The Revolution: A Manifesto" by Ron Paul. Test your faith by
going over the full and clear definition of textbook libertarianism.
Disagree with it as much as you please. And criticize it all you want
then. At least you'll know what libertarianism is and whatever you come
up with will likely be valid and appreciated.
Clearnet: https://mises.org/store/Revolution-The-A-Manifesto-P481.aspx
Also you seem to have read a somewhat different history of industrialisation than I have.
Funny
how the industrial revolution "squalor" that's usually brought up when
criticizing the market always fails to consider where Britain was right
before industrialization: The Dark Ages. No squalor then right?!
::)
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Yes I have read the books you recommend and several more besides.
They are full of interesting ideas. I have also read many other books
about many subjects. John Locke, Thomas Paine, Rousseau, Adam Smith,
Thomas Hobbes, Decline and Fall of Roman Empire. I love to read.
Das Kapital. The Condition of the working class in England. I have read
many books where I think well that's one way of looking at things and is
true for a certain value of true.
I haven't achieved much with the life I was given but I have read and read and read.
You appear to think that the dark ages immediately
preceded the industrial revolution. You are glossing over nearly 1000
years. In fact men and women during the dark ages were much healthier
and taller than the starvling specimens of the early industrial period
working class. This is well established from skeletons. However, as I
say, nearly 1000 years.
Industrialisation
in England began with agriculture, with inventions that increased the
productivity of the land, while reducing the numbers of workers needed
to work it. At the same time the triangular slave trade began bringing
slaves to work the plantations, cotton and other produce to the
factories that were springing up in the cities, and finished goods which
were sold into Europe and the money used to purchase moire slaves. Also
the galleon trade was taking precious metals from the Americas, with
incredible impacts on the economies of Asia and Europe. As I say, its
complicated.
The cities that grew
in the North of England were flooded with economic migrants from the
country admittedly drawn by higher wages and enclosure of land for wool
farming by landowners (a process began in the medieval period as the
feudal system gave way to a mercantile system. Medieval period.
Remember?)
So, while market innovations
hugely increased wealth and prosperity, at the same time there were
always more workers than the factories needed, keeping wages low. There
was immense poverty in the midst of this newly created wealth. Also
slavery was at the core of this wealth production.
The factory hands had very few rights, although I guess you would
argue that they entered into voluntary contracts with the mill owners.
Previously weavers had been well paid skilled workers but with increased
automation and steam power etc. these jobs began to pay less than
subsistence wages, forcing children to join the workforce. Again, these
children were entering into free contacts with the mill owners.
In many ways the workers were worse off than the
slaves. When economic recession hit (the science of economics being in
it's infancy) after various bubbles, the factory owners could say to the
workers. "I'm afraid I have no work for you at present and so obviously
I cannot be expected to support you in your idleness". A slave owner at
least had an interest in keeping his property in working order. But
workers were always replaceable for much less initial outlay.
I didn't intend this to become a history lesson, although perhaps you might consider boning up.
What I resent most I think is the false
dichotomy of total free market, or total state control of economy.
I am fully on board with the free market as
the only and best way og determining prices and levels of production.
It is not even an ideology, its just what happens when people are left
alone to get on with things.
What I
don't get is why, having been so taken with the elegance of the market
mechanism, libertarians think 'right, that's it. That's the final word
on human affairs. The only thing that can assure the greatest human
happiness is for us just to leave the market be. It is perfect and
infallible in its decisions and must not be meddled or tampered with in
any way'
Why would this be the case? Are
things usually this simple? And if the market makes a decision we
dislike, can we not just interfere and let the ever flexible market
adjust to our ham fisted alterations?
It
was mentioned that 'the esoteric activity' of the City of London
(esoteric meaning 'hidden, only understood by initiates) supportsthe
rest of the country. I never disputed this, but I believe it does so
rightly. Both by the wealth it generates, and its contribution to our
redustributive tax system. It is right that our society cushions its
citizens against sudden changes. That's part of why society forms in the
first place.
I think the huge gulf
between US and UK thought on these matters stems the from the fact that
the US formed from a collection of much smaller colonies and independent
polities, over which a federal government slowly excerted greater
control, finally explicitly claiming dominance at the time of thecivil
war (it is my understanding that States were meant to be able to secede
pretty much at will in the constitution).
In the UK we have pretty much accepted a hierarchical centralised
system and grown with it, from the absolute rule of Plantagenet kings,
through the balance of baronial power and Monarchy at Magna Carta,
followed by the increased role of Parliament after restoration of
Charles II, cemented by the bloodless coup of the Glorious Revolution of
1688. After the intense oppression of the urban poor during early
industriasl revolution, the fear inspired by the french revolution
caused a relaxation of conditions and introduction of universal
suffrage helped secure rights for workers to share in the wealth
generated by capitalism and free mnarkets.
Then we have the European Apocalypse, the end of the old world. To
fight the state controlled totalitarian opponents the UK became a
planned economy on a war footing.. Since then the government has slowly
released its hold.
The US benefitted
hugely from being the last nation standing, and having the huge economic
growth engendered by production of materiel without the disadvantage of
cities reduced to rubble.
Aah fuck it.
Don't get me wrong, Ron Paul has some interesting ideas. But I just
don't get why we aren't allowed to interfere with the free market.
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A great history review Hungry Ghost! I'm not as fluent in
European or English history as I'd like to be, so it was
appreciated.
I particularly liked the part at the end
where you discussed the change in English politics in response to the
French revolution. Nothing like seeing the richest folks in the
country next door being decapitated to make one reconsider a safety net
for the poor.
I will reiterate my agreement with HG's point also,
that Capitalism is not only a good thing, but essential. It is
the greatest engine of wealth creation that could exist. It really
should be considered an economic law, in the way gravity is.
Denying it seems silly, and will not cause one to float.
So what
we need is a form of government that prevents the heads being chopped
off, but allows capitalism to generate wealth for all.
Which
sounds like more or less what we have in most western countries.
Maintaining this balance is the job of a government that is of the
people, for the people, and by the people (us).
Like Ron Paul, our role is to participate in the government to help ensure that this balance is adjusted based on events.
We have seen the government enemy, and they are us.
Cheers.
R.
-
A
great history review Hungry Ghost! I'm not as fluent in European
or English history as I'd like to be, so it was appreciated.
I
particularly liked the part at the end where yout cussed the change in
English politics in response to the French revolution. Nothing
like seeing the richest folks in the country next door being decapitated
to make one reconsider a safety net for the poor.
I will
reiterate my agreement with HG's point also, that Capitalism is not only
a good thing, but essential. It is the greatest engine of wealth
creation that could exist. It really should be considered an
economic law, in the way gravity is. Denying it seems silly, and
will not cause one to float.
So what we need is a form of
government that prevents the heads being chopped off, but allows
capitalism to generate wealth for all.
Which sounds like more or
less what we have in most western countries. Maintaining this
balance is the job of a government that is of the people, for the
people, and by the people (us).
Like Ron Paul, our role is to participate in the government to help ensure that this balance is adjusted based on events.
We have seen the government enemy, and they are us.
Cheers.
R.
The same goes for the russian revolution. Nothing like
seeing revolution , even in an unrexpexted quarter, to make the
capitalists think 'hmmm maybe we had better improve things for our
workers " (I am using this language, not because I am a communist. I am
not. The hammer and sickle tattoo on my face was a youthful folly I
regret. It is just the language of the time)
Also huge slaughter of working age men in 1st world war improved the
supply vs demand of labour, again forcing concessions from
employers.
In general, the history libertarians
promote: free markets introduced, great wealth generated is broadly
true. But the wealth is concentrated in the hands of the few . Its kind
of a tautology that in capitalism the capitalists accumulatethe capital.
I expect that sounds really good in German!
The wealth is not generally shared until some other force intervenes.
I
read an article on the Ludwig von Mises site where it was argued that
in a free market, the only way a company can flourish is by serving its
customers. So that it is the greatest system because the only way the
power driven can attain power is by better serving their customers. This
is great until you remember that consumers are all often also workers,
and so competition to drive down prices of consumer goods also drives
down their wages. However:
The model
adopted after Great War was to outsource poor to the colonies. Improve
conditions for poor in your own country to avert threat of revolution,
and keep the workers in the third world colonies. After the 2nd world
war a clever tweak was to return self governance to the colonies, while
keeping all the good stuff like oil and agricultural land in western
companies hands. This is the economic model that persists to this day.
The economist Joseph Stiglitz, one time head of
the world bank ,has convincingly argued that forcing free trade on
developing countries before they are ready basically allows them to be
raped of their resources. Most developing countries primarily
produce raw materials which they sell cheaply to western countries who
process them into higher value goods. Of course thus is a freely
entered into exchange, and the western countries are free to add
conditions forbidding the developing countries from , well, developing
any competing industries.
The
developing countries that have succeeded in most development are those
that insist on protectionism for their own industries until they are big
and robust enough to play with the big boys (as all western country's
did during their development) Only certain developing countries have the
right conditions to perform this defiance though.
The large multinational agriculture and mineral companies
that naturally agglomerate under free trade (or maybe they don't, maybe
historical contingency allowed their growth, nevertheless they are here
and not going anywhere) can distort free trade to therir own advantage
in the way that large governments can.
The Chicago school of Milton Friedman and his followers has been very
influential . (I am aware that they are not libertarians but they
believe in small government and extreme free trade) They have wreaked
havoc in South America and other developing regions by leaping in at
timess of crisis (usually as emmissaries of the IMF) and insisting on
privatisation of all industries and opening up of markets to
international capital. This has rarely had the expected beneficial
effects.
I understand that the IMF is no
doubt anathema to libertarianism. The point I am making is that opening
up developing countries to free trade too soon results in asset
stripping and currency raids by speculators
Take China. It's current growth is widely trumpeted as a
success of the free market, in fact China has enough clout on the
world stage to protect its developing industries until they can compete
with more established ones.
Well....I have once again spent so long
writing this I have totally forgot the crushing arguments I intended to
conclude with. Let's just assume you are totally crushed. I'm OK with it
if you are?
My partner always asks
me what I'm doing so long on the computer everymmorning. I tell her/him
I'm looking at child porn, its easier than explaining that I'm debating
libertarianism (which I partly support) on the forum of an
illegal online drugs market founded on agorist principles. Its just
easier. And they are only images right? I'm not complicit in child abuse
if I happen to view them any more than looking at pictures ofthe
holocaust makes me a Nazi. The swastika on my other cheek is what makes
me a Nazi.
(You realise kmfkewn has left us.?
I'm going to miss him. He had this ability to make outrageous arguments
and then defend them annoyingly well, but with flaws, that made him a
pleasure to debate. Not like you Baraka.. The Dark ages immediately
before industrial revolution. Get to fuck. You have disgraced yourself
and your country's education system)
-
TL;DR
May return to it later. Can see a few howlers already
(ie. the Chicago school wrecked South America). But then again sometimes
it's just not worth the bother.
-
Like I said before if you believe libertarianism will work. You must
believe that we all wish to work for the same reasons and we all wish
to work under the free market system of governance and that anyone who
doesn't wish to adhere to that system should simply vanish away... poof.
but sadly for your libertarian dreams this does not happen and these
people don't just want to die and vanish away they thrive to survive
just as you and I do and when they can not they still do so by all means
necessary. Do you really want people breaking in to your house to
murder you and steal your food everyday? Do you really want lines of
bodies outside of your house demonstrating all of the people you have
killed who attempted to rob you? Not all libertarians believe in
legalizing drugs what if it is you who is forced to starve would you
just vanish away and let yourself die, I think not. Just as is the same
with communism when you make one exception you have diverged from the
true ideology and are no longer talking about Communism or
libertarianism. in reality no one system works completely that is why we
have blended and are still blending all of the systems together to see
which one works for our inevitably small group of people. Humans are
imperfect hence you can't create a perfect system for imperfect
beings
-
It's not is it. I'm spending far too much of my time discussing
this. It's mostly when I've just woke up and I'm drinking coffee trying
to stop kids fighting. I should get my nose out of the computer and
interact with my beautiful children. Fucking technology. Lets me
exchange snippy remarks about each others grasp of history and economics
with anonymous strangers, while ignoring my children.
I think I meant economic thought influenced by the Chicago
school, (minimal taxation small state). And to be honest it might of
been SE Asia I was thinking of. And I guess libertarians dont agree with
the IMF anyway.
Looking back over the
thread I think we can all agree that we are all prone to
generalisations, straw men, distirtions of each others arguments, and
pronouncing confidently on things we don't always have all the facts on.
I guess I was kind of insulted to be told I don't know what
libertarianism is, having spent a good deal of time reading the works
recommended to me by people on this site. I just haven't found the
arguments as convincing as they have. And so I try in my hamfisted way
to formulate arguments as to why this might be.
And then I see a TL:DR and realise, what the fuck am I doing. Who
cares. Maybe if Rand Paul gets elected I will start to care more.
It's just the whole 'whatever you do Don't touch
the market' idea I don't get…no I'm off again. Fuck it I'm out of
arguments. Just remember, the dark ages were along time before the
industrial revolution
-
Well, it would seem that this thread has run it's course, and as I
said once before, I apprecaite everyone participating in it.
I wondered if somone could persuade me to take up the libertarian banner again, but alas I don't this that's happened.
I
do still really like the libertarian passion for personal freedom and
hatred of the drug war, and support for free markets. All things I
too am passionate about.
As you say though Hungry Ghost, without
kmfkewn being here saying crazy but also thought provking things, it
does seem a bit lonely.
I'll certainly keep an eye on the thread,
and if anyone posts anything just too tempting not to
refute...well...it'll give me reason to return.
All the best.
R.
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Nah. I just spat my dummy at the 'I haven't really read it but I can
see at a glance that you wrong in so many ways' remark. My army
of black and white straw men stand poised at top of slippery slope
ready to slide into action at any moment. They are soaked in sweet
sweet petrol, and all it will take is one spark for me to bring them
flaming into action!
Its not quite hemlock time yet.